


A Field Guide to the Kyle of Tongue, Scotland.

by TheIndianWinter



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: A cat - Freeform, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Celtic Mythology & Folklore, Lots of running about the Highlands, M/M, Magic, Scotland, scottish mythology - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-28
Updated: 2020-01-28
Packaged: 2021-02-25 02:34:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 22,445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22424779
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheIndianWinter/pseuds/TheIndianWinter
Summary: Welcome to Tongue! We’re a village located on the north coast of Scotland, bordered by sea and sky and we sit under the shadow of the four peaks of Ben Loyal. But don’t let our small size put you off; Tongue has plenty of interesting things to see; castle ruins, dramatic coastline, teleporting sheep, a definitely-not-immortal bookshop owner, and the guy with the vintage Bentley he definitely, definitely doesn’t know.Something is afoot with the magic of the world and it seems to be emanating from this strange, isolated little spot in the north of Scotland. Anathema Device comes to Tongue to investigate.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 8
Kudos: 57
Collections: Good Omens Big Bang 2019





	1. Introduction

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! This was my entry to the 2019 Good Omens Big Bang!  
> It was born in July, in the depths of my Masters thesis, when I was longing to escape North. Tongue is a real village, that I visited in 2018, and I absolutely fell in love with the place. It also felt like the perfect setting for a fic inspired by the other towns were weird things happen Kepler, WV and Hawkins, IN. (I was deep in TAZ: Amnesty at this point too). 
> 
> The wonderful art for this fic is was done by the very talented [Camilieroart.](https://camilieroart.tumblr.com/) [See it here.](https://camilieroart.tumblr.com/post/190512880852/here-is-the-cover-i-made-for-theindianwinter-i/)
> 
> Beta'd by the lovely Malu.

** A Field Guide to the Kyle of Tongue, Scotland **

_Yes, this is a guidebook to the Kyle of Tongue. Some may question the necessity of such a guide, the Kyle being but a small place at the top of Sutherland, but this author disagrees. The author would also like to clarify that they have made no promise to remain unbiased and in fact believes the insertion of opinion only lends a distinctive flavour to this guidebook, much as the village of Tongue has its own distinctive flavour, being a place where Odd Things happen. Well… not really. It is a fairly ordinary village on the north coast of Scotland, but if you remain in town for long enough, the locals will begin to regale you with tall tales of teleporting sheep, houses burning down only to still be there and giant birds that eat the livestock. None of these things actually happened, of course, but the weird local mythology is part of what makes Tongue such a great place to visit. The main reason is the stunning scenery._

_Despite what locals might imply, magic does not exist, but here is the kind of place where you start to believe it might._


	2. I: The Kyle of Tongue

**I**

**The Kyle of Tongue**

_Contrary to popular belief, the name Tongue comes not from that muscled mouth-appendage, but from the Old Norse word for a spit of land shaped like a tongue. Etymology is weird. Basically no, it doesn’t mean that kind of tongue, except it does, just in another language. Also, kyle is a term for something kind of like a sea loch and has nothing to do with (and long predates) that wee git Kyle from your Primary 4 class who stole your best gel-pen._

_The bridge and causeway that cross the Kyle of Tongue were built in 1971 to avoid having to go all the way around, like one still has to do on the neighbouring Loch Eriboll, making life much easier because who could really be bothered? Unfortunately it was built in the 1970s, a decade famed for some of the worst road building the UK has seen (the M8, Spaghetti Junction, the M25), and so it walks that awkward line between visually uninteresting and ugly as sin._

* * *

The morning sun broke through a thin crack in the clouds, reaching down to stroke the rippling surface of the water. 

A man, or at least a man-shaped being, stood on the metal platform inside the ruins, leaning against the railing. He looked, to the casual observer, as if he was merely out to enjoy the fresh morning air, but the man was waiting. 

The sound of footsteps drew closer and the man tensed, shoulders sharp under his black jacket. 

He waited until the footsteps had climbed the metal steps of the platform before he glanced over his shoulder with a casualness that was all pretence. 

Another person arrived at the top, cheeks flushed and puffing to catch their breath. The salty wind tousled the light curls atop their head. 

“Lovely morning for a stroll,” said the man, as if greeting a stranger. He was not.

The other man, still a little breathless, glanced around. It had the added benefit of hiding the little smile that twitched at his lips.

“Must we always meet at the castle?”

It was not really a question that demanded an answer, but the first man replied anyway. He kept looking out over the Kyle, eyes hidden behind dark glasses. 

“This isn’t like London, angel,” he said, “There aren’t a whole lot of other places we can go.”

The second man followed his gaze to the rocky islands at the mouth of the Kyle. 

“I suppose not,” he sighed. “So then Crowley, anything to report?” 

Crowley shook his head.

“Everything is quiet,” he said. “Too quiet.”

Aziraphale gave a thoughtful hum, staring off into the distance.

“Yes, I don’t like it either.”

There was a pause.

“Is there anything we can do?”

Crowley sighed, “Not until we know what we’re dealing with. If we’re even dealing with something.”

“You’re right,” Aziraphale said, “It could well be nothing.”

Neither of them looked convinced. 

* * *

The Kyle of Tongue had seen an upsurge in tourism since the North Coast 500 had been launched. The residents were welcoming enough, one could suppose, but they never suggested one should stay for any great length of time. 

It wasn’t due to any amount of distaste for visitors, no, more that if anyone stayed there long enough, they might notice that things in Tongue were not exactly normal. 

You see, it was up, isolated on the north coast, where the endless skies and salty air were charged with the distinct sense of possibility. Beneath the looming shadow of Ben Loyal, one got the sense they were somewhere else entirely. Somewhere were the modern world seemed not to exist and strangeness was all the more probable. 

It was a place where the nights were black, so incredibly dark, where the few streetlights in town were feeble and there was a last lamppost on the left before the road was swallowed up by the night. 

(This lamppost is somewhat special, we will return to it later.)

The village had the few amenities one would expect; post office, police station, a pub, a village shop, but it also had a bookshop. The bookshop had been in the same hands since it opened in the fifties, and that wasn’t the only way in which its owner had not changed. Everyone in the village knew about the odd Mr Fell, but they pretended not to notice, he was happier that way. 

(They also went along with it when he pretended that he did not know Mr Crowley, the strange man who lived just outside of town, who never bought petrol, but had a Bentley, who had arrived in town at the same time as Fell (with the same shadowed look in his eye), who had never changed either. They met up once a week in Castle Bharraich or on the ruins of the old pier and then would go back to ‘Oh Mr Fell, he’s the one with the bookshop, aye?’ and ‘Oh Crowley, he’s the fellow with the vintage Bentley, right?’ You had to commend them for their efforts at least.)

Yes, there were a lot of strange things about the village of Tongue, if one only looked closely.

* * *

Crowley stood on the crumbling stone pier, in defiance of the faded red sign that read ‘Dangerous Pier: Please Keep Off.’ He wore sunglasses despite the heavy grey sky that threatened rain. He seemed nonchalant, though his companion was ill at ease. 

Aziraphale wore a sensible green tweed jacket and a tartan bow tie that clashed horribly. He hung back on the stony shore. There was still the pretence there, as if they were merely two strangers who had encountered one another whilst out for a stroll. 

“Still nothing?” asked Crowley.

Aziraphale was staring at the water as it lapped at a worn red brick.

“Still nothing.”


	3. II: Thistle Cottage

**II**

**Thistle Cottage**

_Thistle Cottage was retroactively named as such in a patriotic move by Douglas Ramsay in 1919. Previously, the cottage had been known as the Ramsays’ and even now tended just to be referred to as Number 7. As a consequence, the other cottages on the road began to adopt other such local flora names, but after Number 4 claimed Heather Cottage, and then Number 5 reluctantly adopted Fescue Cottage (which has less of a ring to it) the other homeowners ran out of ideas and just went down the unimaginative route of trees. Honestly, there’s nothing particularly exciting about this cottage, and your humble writer is confused as to why it’s being included in this guide. I promise Tongue isn’t so dull that we need to resort to including local properties. (On that note, why not include Tongue House? The whole did-it-burn-down thing is a matter of local debate, though I err on the side of ‘No’ since Tongue House is still there. You’d be genuinely surprised at how controversial this opinion is.)_

* * *

Remember that last lamppost on the left? 

Good. 

The lamppost stood at the edge of the village. It is something that would interest the odd traveller who passed through, mainly the city dwellers with vivid imaginations, that were too accustomed to the omnipresent orange glow of streetlights and would picture things looming in the blackness beyond. To them it seemed unnatural, just a little too dark, but it is in fact entirely natural, and would not seem as dark if the streetlight was not there at all. 

Although, it would be perfectly sensible to be afraid of the dark. 

We can ignore the lamppost for now, its only relevance was that it stood beside Thistle Cottage. 

It was daylight, so the lamppost was just there, and you could see beyond it, as the road curved past the farm and disappeared some hundred yards ahead. 

Thistle Cottage was the seventh and last of the identical houses dotted along the road. It had stood empty since Josie Ramsay had disappeared into the forest some three years before. She had left specific instructions and her house key with Mary Maculloch at the Post Office that under no circumstances should she be followed. After a year, everyone agreed that she might not show up again at some point. 

Craig Naismith and his sons had combed the forest whilst looking for their errant sheep. (It was a particular sheep. She had earned the name Houdini. Once, Craig had sworn she teleported out of the barn and into his cellar.) There was no sign of Josie or Houdini. 

Mary had gotten a little sick of maintaining Thistle Cottage as a holiday let, so she ignored everyone else’s scepticism and advertised it for rent online before the holiday season could begin again. After three months, one Anathema Device, 30, single, no children, sent her an enquiry via email. One week later, Anathema arrived. 

Mary had been uncertain what to expect. Sure, the woman seemed nice enough, but she had brought enough cash to pay the deposit and the first four months upfront. When Mary had offered to take her battered leather suitcase, she had only clutched it tighter. It was odd.

“You said in your email you’ve been living in Edinburgh?” said Mary, eyeing the rather thick wool coat she was wearing. It was Northern Scotland, so it wasn’t exactly warm, but it was still summer. 

“Uh-huh,” she replied. 

Ah. American. 

Anathema was looking skittishly around, until her eyes stilled on Morag, the wild black cat that the whole village had adopted. Morag stayed silent. It was a relief. She had a tendency to screech. Anathema gave the cat a half-smile and Morag started to follow them up the road. 

Perhaps, thought Mary, this Anathema was the right kind of odd for Tongue. 

* * *

“There’s someone new in town,” said Aziraphale.

Crowley blinked out over the Kyle. 

“Mary rented Josie’s old place then?”

“To a young American woman, she said.”

“Think she’ll stay long?”

Aziraphale hummed thoughtfully. 

“There’s something a little strange about her,” he said. “Morag has taken to following her about.”

“The cat?”

He nodded.

“Perhaps she’s a witch,” Crowley mused, with a sly grin. 

Aziraphale only frowned, “I haven’t encountered a real witch in a hundred years.”

Crowley’s expression turned serious once more. 

“Me either.”

* * *

Anathema Device had been in Tongue for thirty hours and she had already bought all of the coffee Marj and Stuart had in stock. The day before yesterday had been a long journey up to Thurso and she had had to get up early that morning for the bus west. She needed caffeine for the long nights of searching ahead. She never could sleep through the afternoons, but she couldn’t exactly carry out her research in broad daylight, even somewhere as quiet as here. In fact, in such a small village, she would likely raise more suspicions. 

The summer nights were even longer here, so it was well after ten before she even set out that evening, a satchel of equipment over her shoulder. 

There was a path between the pub and the bank that led down, out of the village and towards the little ruined tower on the hill. It headed across a grassy field, yellowed under the sun, then slithered up the side of the steep, rocky hill. 

Anathema plonked herself down in the field, facing out towards the water, the looming peaks of Ben Loyal to her back, a great hulking shadow in the night. 

She checked around, just to make sure there was no-one around, then pulled out her flask of coffee, a notebook and a series of odd little devices that looked like they could be used for navigation, if one’s ultimate destination was simply ‘lost.’ 

There was an odd little circular thing made of tin and glass, that looked and behaved like an over-engineered compass, but didn’t always point north, though it did now. Anathema frowned down at it. There wasn’t much north left before you were in the sea. 

She then pulled out what to the untrained eye might just have been a digital alarm clock, but came with a rather alarming needle-like attachment that Anathema stabbed into the ground. It gave two sharp beeps, then the screen displayed a reading that looked like Greek but was not. 

Anathema gave a satisfied hum, and jotted the strange symbols down into her notebook. 

The device in question was an imaginatively named magicometer. It worked almost exactly like a thermometer, but it measured the ambient magic. It had been invented by the witch John Cats, a practical man, who couldn’t exactly be credited for the breadth of his imagination - he had named his first-born son John, and his second Jonathan (Jon, for short). Traditional magicometers were filled with a liquid that wasn’t mercury; it reacted to different levels of magic in the air, though in a rather more obstreperous manner. At normal levels of magic, this was fine, but at the levels of magic in Tongue, a traditional magicometer would have gone far past the level of loud hissing and pulsating blue. 

With a digital magicometer, one had no such issues, though the pin was starting to vibrate slightly and when Anathema pulled it from the ground, it was almost uncomfortably warm to the touch. 

At least she was in the right place now. Or close to it, anyway, though the part about the snake still made no sense. That was the trouble with the Nutter prophecies, they only really made perfect sense after the fact and the woman had loved the use of metaphor. (She also had a tendency to focus on things that seemed rather more inconsequential. For example, she had predicted the recipe change in ‘brewed iron’, but her prophecies had made no reference to big events, like the death of Diana or whatever the fuck Brexit was.)

‘ _Serpente’s Tongue’_ had been troubling Anathema for years until a friend had made mention of passing through the village on a road trip. But the serpent could be an actual snake, or be about betrayal, or temptation, or a host of other possible interpretations Anathema had filed in the back of her mind, ready for when one of them would finally make sense. 

There was a screech, somewhere off to her right and Anathema jumped, glancing into the darkness until she spotted a small shadow with glowing eyes. 

It was the cat from before. 

“Hello there.”

The cat approached, slowly, then made a quick dive into her satchel.

“Hey!” she cried, reaching for her bag. The cat remerged, not with her ham sandwich, but with her small pouch of runestones, which it dropped into her lap. 

“Huh,” she muttered, glancing from the pouch to the cat, which had retreated to sit primly on a rock about two feet away. Anathema shrugged to herself and tossed the stones into the air. They settled, a few inches from the grass in a very strange pattern, a pattern Anathema had not seen before, though there was some familiarity to the way it unfurled at its centre. Magic, sure, that much was a given, but it wasn’t just the magic Anathema knew, the kind she could feel coursing through the great seams of power that criss-crossed the globe. 

This was a different kind of magic. 

She pulled her runestones from the air again and attempted to seek it out, a difficult task, considering that she was pretty much directly on a ley line. 

But there was definitely something else in the background and so she reached out until, yes, there it was.

Anathema tossed the stones again.

Well whatever it was, it was definitely localised. 

The cat gave a satisfied hiss, that for all the world sounded like ‘I told you so.’

* * *

Aziraphale came down the rickety wooden stairs into his shop, a mug of cocoa in hand and a gentle smile on his face. The sky outside promised rain, which meant no visitors to pop in for a chat, or worse, customers who would try to take his books away. No, the day promised to be unproductive in the best kind of way, with a book (which was definitely not the kind that had a passionate embrace on the cover and was filled with heaving bosoms and turgid lengths. Definitely not. Aziraphale was a being of taste, thank you very much) and a warm cup of cocoa, succeeded by a lovely glass of port in the evening. 

Before he could make it to his chair, however, he spotted a slip of paper that had not been on his leather top desk when he had headed up the night before. It was slightly yellowed and looked like it had been torn from the corner of a page. It was a note. Unsigned. One short sentence. 

‘ _Definitely a witch.’_


	4. III: Coldbackie Beach

**III**

**Coldbackie Beach**

_Genuinely the worst beach in the UK. Anyone who tells you of its white sands, craggy sea caves, rock pools, and fabulous views out over the Kyle to the Rabbit Islands is telling you a lie. Honestly. Just don’t bother going here._

* * *

Adam Young was an ordinary child. Or at least as ordinary as a child could be. Children are often a bit weird, full of wonder and an imagination that usually gets beaten out of them before adulthood. There was however, a feeling you got around Adam, a feeling that perhaps, in another life, he would have been a child who wasn’t ordinary at all. 

Adam lived at number four, Tadfield Lane, Tongue. 

The house had earned the name Hogback before they had even moved there. It was a ramshackle old place, built of unmatched bricks with uneven windows and a wonky front door you had to slam to get it to close properly. 

Mary at the post office had told them it had been built in the thirties by her uncle.

“Did it himself, he did. Made a right pig’s ear of it. And he was the sort who couldn’t tell his arse from his ear.”

The correct phrase, of course, was about arses and elbows, but Mary had first used the joke in a misguided attempt at wit in the typical fashion of a thirteen year old bored at Christmas and nobody had had the heart (or the gall) to tell her otherwise, especially with the many repetitions of the joke since. So number four was known as the Pig’s Arse for a good long while, until the time came to put the house on the market and her family decided to truss the pig up with a slightly more palatable name. 

Adam loved his house, even if it looked like a flan that had been slowly deflating in a cupboard. 

Adam also loved Tongue. Life in general could be pretty boring there, but he had the best ideas for games, and very occasionally something weird would happen. Once, when they were playing in the woods, one of the Naismith’s sheep had teleported into their little circle and the Them had gone on an epic quest, fighting off dragons to return her home. Another time they had found a snake in the alley behind the bookshop, although Mr Fell had insisted that it wasn’t his pet and that there weren’t any snakes in this corner of the world anyway. Adam had returned to his friends a little sullen, but the snake was still curled around Pepper’s shoulders and had remained so through their discussion on which of them could keep it as a pet. (“Your parents won’t even let you get a dog, I doubt they’d want a snake, Adam.”) It was only as Brian had mused whether snakes could swim, that it had given an alarmed little hiss and disappeared off into the bushes. 

Later that week, they had been buying sweets at the village shop and insisting to Marj that they were telling the truth, when Mr Crowley had come in. 

“Oh the snake is mine, he escaped,” he had said, nonchalantly as he handed over an unmarked cardboard box. “Thanks for looking after him. If you find him again, you’re welcome to play with him, but please don’t throw him in a pond.”

Pepper had glanced at Adam then. They shared a look, wondering how he could have known. 

“What’s his name?” asked Brian. 

“Err, Pete?”

The Them caught glimpses of Pete out a few times after that, always near the bookshop. 

For today’s adventure, they were going to spy on the new woman who came to town. Everyone had noticed how Morag the village cat had taken to following her around. 

“Maybe she’s a witch,” chuckled Stuart as he handed over the change. 

Marj gave him a slight elbow to the ribs.

“Stu,” she muttered, “Behave.”

He shrugged, “It wouldn’t be the strangest thing to happen here.”

The Them had dashed out of the shop, clutching their bags of sweets and waited until they were down the lane to whisper furtively.

“A witch!” exclaimed Wensleydale. 

“We don’t know for sure,” said Pepper. “We might just be enforcing sexist stereotypes.”

“Piss,” said Brian. “She lives in a cottage. Witches live in cottages.”

Pepper rolled her eyes, “You live in a cottage, Brian.”

“We need to see what we know,” said Adam. “Then we need to gather more information.”

They returned to their den in the copse out near the back of the Naismith farm. They called it the woods, but it was only around fifty trees at most. 

The den looked like the children had tried to recreate Hogback out of some logs and an old tarpaulin. This presumption wasn’t far off, although Hogback had not been the inspiration, children just weren’t excellent builders and so the resulting structure veered off to the left slightly. 

Inside, there was a whole wealth of toys and knick-knacks. Wensleydale pulled out the chalkboard and since he had the best handwriting, he carefully wrote ‘Thistle Cottage Witch’ across the top. 

After ten minutes, their list read:

‘1. Followed around by Morag. Black cat!

  1. Wears a lot of black
  2. Lives in a cottage 
  3. Carries around a leather book. Spell book?’



As lists went, it wasn’t very long or conclusive. 

“Oh,” said Brian. “And my dad saw her out last night, on his way back from the pub.”

“That doesn’t mean anything!” cried Pepper.

“Yeah it does,” he argued. “She was coming back from the fields.”

Adam nodded, as sage as an eleven-year-old could manage to be. “That is the sort of thing witches do. They go out and blight crops. I read that in a book.”

Pepper sighed and Wensleydale obligingly added, ‘5. Goes out in fields at night’ to the list. 

“Now what?” asked Wensleydale.

“We should go observe the target,” said Adam. “We need disguises.”

“Hats!” said Brian. “Witches wear shitting hats. So we should wear hats, to confuse the piss out of ‘em.”

It should be noted that Brian had just discovered swearing and had taken to peppering his sentences with as many curses as possible, in much the same way that a novice writer sprinkled commas through sentences that should have ended ten words ago. 

Pepper frowned, “She doesn’t have a hat though.”

“She could leave it off,” said Wensley, “You know, throw people off the scent.”

“Or maybe it’s invisible.”

“We should go get hats,” agreed Adam. “Meet back outside the shop?”

* * *

Anathema dropped her bag onto the kitchen table and slumped into a chair with a weighty sigh. 

It was late afternoon and she had spent the day exploring a mile or so up the road at Tongue House. All she had been able to conclude was that whatever was affecting the ley lines lay north of here. Also whatever the other magic was, it was definitely centred on the village. 

Maybe she had just imagined it the night before.

She pulled out the runestones and scattered them into the air. They landed an inch or so above the wooden surface in the same pattern as the night before. 

Right, not imagined then. 

There was a loud gasp from outside. Anathema looked sharply to the window as four heads ducked down. The red pom-pom of a bobble hat still peeked above the frame. 

The four kids Anathema found outside were at least brave enough not to run away when she fixed them with a look from her doorway. 

They were all dressed strangely - in shorts and t-shirts for the warm summer weather, but each of them was wearing a hat. The boy in the pink glittery cowboy hat, stepped forward.

“Excuse me,” he asked, “But are you a witch?”

Anathema blinked. 

“What makes you think that?”

“You wear a lot of black,” said the boy in the bobble hat. 

“And you go out in the fields at night,” said the one in the bucket hat, whose face was covered in what Anathema hoped was chocolate. 

“And Morag follows you around,” said the first boy, the one in the pink cowboy hat. 

The girl sighed, rolling her eyes at her friends. She was wearing a mustard yellow beret. 

“And we just saw you make those stones levitate.”

“Ah,” said Anathema, “Well. Erm. I suppose that one’s a bit less subjective, isn’t it?” 

The four children just looked at her as if she had sprouted another head, which in a way she had, if you replaced the head with a big flashing neon sign saying ‘witch.’

“Would you like to come in?” she said, at a loss for any other way to carry on this conversation. 

They all exchanged a series of glances that ranged from curious to wary. 

“I have some candy,” she added. “Chocolate.”

That definitely seemed to help. The small bespectacled boy in the bobble hat stepped forward. 

“Okay.”

Once they were all seated around the table, Anathema wracked her mind for how to begin. 

“What’s with the hats?”

The boy in the pink hat, who seemed to be the unofficial leader, spoke up, “We thought they would be a good disguise. Like the old days witch-hunters. Since witches wear hats and all.”

Anathema withheld a wince at the mention of witch hunt. 

“But I don’t have any hats?”

“Not even an invisible one?” asked bucket-hat chocolate-face. 

“Nope,” Anathema said. She supposed their logic sort-of made sense. Which was generally how child logic worked - you needed to go at things with a bit of an imagination. 

The children all exchanged a look, then seemed to come to a silent agreement. 

“I’m Adam,” said pink hat. “And this is Pepper, Brian and Wensleydale.” He pointed to mustard beret, bucket hat, and bobble hat in turn. “What’s your name?”

“I’m Anathema,” she said. “Pleased to meet you all.”

“Can we have chocolate now?” asked Wensleydale. 

* * *

“So what you’re saying is that this magic is all around us?” asked Pepper. 

“Like the force!” exclaimed Brian. 

Anathema nodded. She didn’t have much knowledge of pop culture, so it took her a moment to figure out what on earth they were referencing. But it sounded close enough. 

“And something near Tongue is affecting the magic?”

“Somewhere north of here,” Anathema confirmed, tracing her finger up the Kyle. 

“So like Scullomie or Coldbackie?” said Pepper. 

Adam’s eyes widened.

“Coldbackie.”

“Coldbackie?” Anathema echoed. 

Adam smiled, reaching over to tap the map. 

“It’s about three miles north of here, there’s this really nice beach, but there’s a sea cave there.”

“Yeah,” agreed Brian. “That place is really creepy.”

“I bet if there’s anything evil messing with the magic, it’ll be there.”

“We don’t know if it’s evil yet,” said Anathema. “But, yes, that sounds like a good place to start. I’ll go there tomorrow.”

“Cool,” said Adam. “We can come with you.”

Anathema blinked. She hadn’t quite anticipated that. 

“Are you sure you want to come?”

“We do know the area better than you,” reasoned Pepper.

Brian grinned around his chocolate bar, “And we can see you doing witch stuff and shit.”

“Plus it takes ages to walk there,” said Wensleydale.

“You could borrow my older sister’s bike. It doesn’t have any gears, but it still goes.”

Anathema smiled, “That would be nice, I guess.”

* * *

Though the day was sunny, with just a few silvery white clouds that drifted slowly across the sky, the breeze was bracing, and the salt danced over Anathema’s cheeks, even as they came to a stop in a small lay-by at the side of the road.  
“Can we just leave our bikes here?” she asked, as the four children dropped theirs down onto the grass. 

“It’ll be fine,” said Adam, “It’s the car park for the beach.”

Anathema gave it a sceptical glance. She had grown up on the California coast, where people had left their cars, baking in the sun on great sandy lots, not on poorly surfaced extensions to the road that could maybe hold three cars. Still, she dropped the rusty old bike next to the others and took the satchel Pepper held out for her (her bike had a basket, which annoyed her greatly, as it was a girls’ bike, and she always made sure she had pockets anyway). 

“This way,” said Adam, having already procured a long stick to whack at the long grass with. The path to the beach sloped down, rather steep in places, with rocks half-covered in sand. Anathema dropped onto the white sand with a pleased huff. Whether or not there was anything to the cave, she was already glad to be there, for the beach was beautiful. Immediately above them loomed the fissured cliff face of a hill. Wensleydale told her the name, something lovely and lilting in Gaelic, that she would find impossible to pronounce were she to see it written, but roughly translated to the Watch Hill. Carved between the two rocky outcroppings, all covered in greenish moss and rough barnacles, lay the beach itself, a long, almost perfect crescent, marked only with a few patches of stones and shells and their footprints. 

The sound of a screech drew her attention, and she whipped around to find Brian, a little way off, chasing Wensley with what looked to be a dead crab. Pepper seemed to be playing a game of tag with the waves that lapped at the sand, whilst Adam was using his stick to draw something rude in the sand. Well, she supposed, boys would be boys and if you gave them a canvas, they would draw a penis on it sooner or later. 

Anathema flopped down with something between a sigh and a chuckle, content to let the children play for now. She splayed her hand, feeling the grains of sand pass through and over her fingers. It was harder to read here, than on solid ground, but she could still sense the magic that flowed, still feel those tremors in the energy that worried her so. Yet despite the sand, the magic felt rawer, even when compared to Tongue, just a few miles away, as if it was closer to the surface. 

“Would you like to look at the cave now?” asked Adam, making her jump. 

“Yes,” said Anathema, and she heaved herself up from the sand. She followed behind him, as he led her towards where a rocky ledge jutted out across the beach, the slowly encroaching sea almost entirely cutting off the beach behind it. After a few paces, Adam turned to call to his friends. 

“Oi!”

They continued walking. Pepper was the first to reach them, trainers sodden and she rolled her eyes mightily as she spotted Adam’s masterpiece. Brian, it seemed, had dropped the crab, swapping it for a slimy, curling ribbon of seaweed, which he dragged behind him. Wensleydale’s face was flushed and he puffed, steaming up his glasses, though he soon forgot his fatigue as their strange little troop rounded the rocks. 

The cave, Anathema had to agree, seemed the exact sort of place where a fairytale monster should hide. It was a gaping maw in the cliff-face, the entrance marked by a couple of reddish rocks, like broken, blood-stained teeth. Something a little like dread tugged at her stomach. 

“It’s just a cave,” she whispered to herself. 

“You okay?” asked Adam. 

She nodded, stepping to the front of the group and pulling out her head torch. The cave wasn’t very big inside and Anathema soon found she had to stoop down as she worked her way along the narrow passage. As they neared the end, she could feel her stomach twisting more and more. She pulled out her compass but frowned as the needle continued to point north. Then the needle stuttered, swinging to point to something just off to the right, then it returned to pointing north. The children remained quiet behind her. 

Anathema edged forward a little further, then she looked backwards. The daylight seemed so much further away than she knew it to be. 

“I’m going to turn off the light a second,” she said. The little click plunged them into darkness. 

Anathema blinked blindly into the pitch black. She made a few more steps forward, carefully, on the uneven ground. Then she saw it. 

At first, it looked almost like a crack in the rock, but there was a vague glow to it, the colour swirling between a moody violet and a bright lilac. There was no heat to it as she held out the back of her hand towards it, but she could feel it burn. 

The dread in her stomach dissipated a moment, to return with a new vigour, one fuelled by the realisation of just what she was looking at. 

“It’s a crack,” said Adam, peering over her shoulder. “But why is it glowing?”

“Because that crack doesn’t lead outside,” she said. 

“Where does it lead then?”

“I don’t know,” she said, honestly. She pushed him back gently with her arm. “We should move away.”

Anathema did not bother to turn her torch back on as they all stumbled back towards the mouth of the cave. She took a great gulp of air, tasting the salt on her tongue, letting it settle into her bones, calming her down. 

Pepper was frowning, “What was in there? We didn’t see.”

“It was a crack,” said Anathema, “A crack in reality.”


	5. IV: Castle Bharraich

**IV**

**Castle Bharraich**

_You drive onto the causeway, catching your first real glimpse of the Kyle. Immediately, your eyes are drawn to Castle Bharraich (or Varrick if you’re a heathen/too English for Gaelic). Why? Well it looks like something drawn straight from that fairytale vision of Scotland you had: a little ruin, isolated high up on the hill, dabbled in the golden afternoon light that breaks through the clouds. Gone is your disillusionment that crept up on you as you stood in the damp Greyfriars Kirkyard, rain seeping through your anorak, being shunted out the way by the seventh Harry Potter tour you’d seen that day. Up close, it is little more than a pile of stones with a viewing platform inside (admittedly with a great panoramic view), but from far away it still embodies exactly what you wanted from this trip - a castle so old, it’s true history is lost to the ancient rocks upon which it stands._

* * *

“How do you know the crack leads to another world then?” Pepper asked, leaning forward over the table. 

Anathema and the Them, (as the children had informed her their gang name was) were crowded around Anathema’s dining table, were they had been for half an hour or so, since they had furiously pedalled back from Coldbackie, loading up on snacks at the village shop on the way. 

“The magic,” Anathema said. “I grew up in California. I’ve been from Cameroon to the Cook Islands. The magic of earth, it has the same feeling anywhere. It’s warm, but it’s gentle. I know magic, but what was coming through that hole, it was different. It burned.”

Adam frowned, “So the magic in the other world, it’s more powerful?”

“I don’t know,” Anathema sighed. “Maybe. This isn’t like anything I’ve encountered before. And that’s not the only thing.”

She tapped Coldbackie on the map and the four of Them leaned in. 

“My compass, it reacted for a moment to the crack in the cave, but it still pointed north.”

“Would you like to go north tomorrow then?” said Adam. 

“We could go to Scullomie, or Skerray.” Brian pointed to the places on the map, leaving a smudge behind on the paper. 

“I’m not sure,” said Anathema, “There’s another kind of magic at play here. It’s centred here, around Tongue. Whatever the source is, maybe it could be of help in some way.”

The Them exchanged a look. 

“Do you think…?” Wensleydale trailed off. 

“What?” asked Anathema, perhaps a little sharply.

Adam nodded, “If there’s something weird in town, they’ll know.”

“They’ve been here for years,” Pepper agreed.

“So the bookshop then?”

“Nah,” Brian shook his head. “Mum said she asked him about it as a kid and he got all weird and shit about it.”

“What about-”

“No!” cried Wensleydale. “He’s like mafia or something. Wears those sunglasses all the time.”

Brian gave an excited bounce in his seat, “And he has connections. He gets all that pre-sugar tax Irn Bru.”

Anathema was not following the conversation. She held up her hands, “I’m sorry, who are you talking about?”

“Mr Fell and Mr Crowley. They’re like immortal or something, so they might be able to help you.”

She blinked.

“I’m sorry, but _what_?”

“Yeah,” said Adam. “They pretend not to know each other and stuff, but they both got here in the fifties, at least that’s what Mary said.”

“There are immortals here?” Anathema asked with a frown. “Didn’t you think that was worth mentioning?”

“Not really,” he shrugged, “They’re pretty normal, ‘cept for the not aging thing.”

Pepper nodded, “Weird stuff goes on here all the time.”

“Like the teleporting sheep.”

“Or the big bird thing that kept eating the cows.”

“Greasy Johnson is probably a changeling.”

It was a lot to take in. Tongue, it seemed, was not the quiet little town she thought it was. Though, given what she had discovered in the sea cave, perhaps strange events were par for the course.

“Has this been happening more frequently recently? The weird things.”

“I don’t think so,” said Adam. “This kind of stuff has always happened.”

“Yeah,” said Wensleydale, “Mary says that Tongue House burnt down in 1974, but the next day, it was fine, like nothing had happened.”

“And not only that,” said Pepper, lowering her voice conspiratorially, “But the exact same thing happened over a hundred years before.”

Or perhaps Tongue was just weird. Perhaps that magic was the village’s own magic, that apparently just wreaked havoc upon itself. 

At least Morag the shrieking cat made a little more sense now.

* * *

Anathema glared at the closed door to the bookshop. It was eleven o’clock on a Wednesday morning and yet the place was shut. The sign on the door was in no way illuminating. 

‘ _This shop opens at-’_ here there was just a very deliberate smudge, ‘- _and closes when I choose. Sometimes I don’t open at all. If you can see me inside, that doesn’t mean the shop is open. If you simply must buy a book, please go do that elsewhere.’_

One had to wonder how the place did any business at all. 

(It did do some small amount of selling, certainly not enough to keep any ordinary shop in business, but just enough visitors left holding books as to keep up the appearance that the place was a real bookshop - as in a shop that sold books - as opposed to just a shop-shaped building with a lot of books inside. The owner found this all very vexing.) 

She heaved a sigh. If she was being perfectly honest with herself, she wasn’t feeling particularly inclined to do much of her research today. There was a sense of urgency, of course, the disturbances to the ley lines had been growing more frequent over the past few months, but the day was the kind that lulled you into a false sense of security. The skies were a soft grey, the air warm, the breeze gentle as it toyed with the strands of her hair. All in all, there was a delightful lack of possibility, it was a day made to amble, no real destination in mind.

Anathema’s eyes landed on the tiny, lopsided ruin stood atop the hill. It wasn’t too high, but it seemed so much further up than Tongue did, looking as it did from this angle, as if it were swearing defiantly up at the sky. 

Well, she could explore, she supposed, easily reconciled with the fact that a better knowledge of Tongue could only help her in her mission. 

As she walked across the field, she thought about her mission. It was self-appointed of sorts, as the Nutter Prophecies were vague, and the world certainly should carry on afterwards, but there were definitely allusions to things, things that needed to be stopped or handled. No-one had ever deduced what that this was exactly, and Anathema’s grandmother had sensed something in the ley lines and ever since then the order that Device line belonged to had dedicated itself to figuring out what Nutter meant. 

Anathema could not be certain, of course, but that crack at Coldbackie had felt significant enough to need handling. 

‘The lines shew the Sundered, that seek Serpente’s Tongue.’

Maybe if she found whatever the serpent referred to. She should ask Adam, he might have an idea on that one. It was a bit disconcerting really, already she was sharing so much of what she had kept to herself all these years, and with children, no less.

As she neared the top of the hill, she could hear two voices, clearly in the midst of a discussion.

“Angel, I just don’t think that we should-“ The man broke off. “Someone’s coming,” he said, more quietly. Anathema started up the metal stairs inside the structure. 

A man hurried past her. 

“Hello,” he said. She didn’t get a good look at him, but she caught the bright flash of a tartan bow tie. 

The other man was still there, reclined against the uneven wall, his face carefully arranged into a look of studied innocence. 

“Lovely day for a walk, isn’t it?” he greeted her. 

Anathema found herself nodding, eyes following him as he slouched by her. 

What an odd couple. 

* * *

There had not been much to do at the castle, it being little more than four walls and all, except to admire the view it offered over the Kyle. 

Anathema had lived for three years in Edinburgh. The city was very different to Tongue, all bright coloured shop fronts and people crowded onto the hills. Once, she had heard the place described as an MC Escher painting, so many steps and they all seemed to go uphill. Still, the place was underpinned with a strange sense of age, or history and magic that drew witches like Anathema into the embrace of its twisting streets. That same magic existed here, far to the north, but it was more raw, it was untapped, settled not into the buildings, but into the moorlands and the rough hills. The Kyle was a place of desolate beauty, isolated by the sea to the north and the great swathe of hills to the south. 

She came once again to the little bridge that crossed over to the fields, where the path then carried on up to the village. Her stomach growled. It was early afternoon, so she thought she might perhaps stop at the pub for lunch. 

The pub was part of the Ben Loyal hotel and had all the classic fixings Anathema had come to expect from British pubs; cream walls, dark wood, worn patterned carpets in colours just dark enough to hide the staining accrued after years of spilled beers, and blackboards detailing the upcoming karaoke events and the month’s specials of local gins and whiskies.

At a small table in the corner sat the man from before, a half-empty whisky glass before him. His head was propped up by his elbow and he was still sporting his sunglasses, despite the dim indoor lighting. Something from yesterday’s conversation with the Them rose to the forefront of her mind, something about sunglasses. It might just be coincidence, but then again, this man could be one of those immortals, the one that Wensley thought was mafia of some kind. Mr Crowley. So the other one she saw was likely Mr. Fell, which would at least explain why the bookshop had been closed.

Fortunately for Anathema, all the other tables were full, so she approached with a smile and the kind of brazen confidence the British seemed to expect of her. 

“Would you mind if I sat?” she asked, “Only there’s no other tables.”

He made no verbal acknowledgement of her, but gestured vaguely at the seat opposite him. Anathema sat down. 

“How was your walk?” he asked. Anathema blinked. She hadn’t expected him to initiate the conversation. He hadn’t seemed the sort. It was probably the sunglasses. 

“It was nice thanks, the view is lovely,” she said, then she made sure to glance around before asking, “Where’s that man I saw you with, your partner?”

The man inhaled the last sip of his whisky and spluttered slightly. The lady behind the bar looked over, her face a mix of surprise and concern.

(Anathema remembered perfectly well that they pretended not to know one another, but the reaction was amusing to say the least.)

“He’s not my partner,” he croaked. “I don’t know him that well at all. We just happened across one another on our walk.”

For his sake, Anathema chose not to acknowledge how obvious a lie that was. 

“My apologies,” she said. “Would you allow me to get you a drink? Since I made you choke on your last one.”

He gave her a slightly pained smile, but nodded, “I’ll take another glass of Talisker, since you’re offering.”

At the bar, the lady leant over before Anathema could so much as open her mouth to order. 

“What on earth did you say to get Mr Crowley so worked up?”

Anathema blinked. 

“I asked if the man I saw him at the castle with was his partner. Guess I assumed wrong.”

“Oh, that’ll be Mr Fell,” she said, seemingly a little less interested now. “They always react like that when you mention the other one. Best just to leave them to it. Now - Anathema, isn’t it? - what can I get for you?”

It was only after Anathema sat down, a whisky and a gin and tonic in hand, that she realised she had never mentioned her name. 

“Thanks,” Mr Crowley said, as she handed over his glass. 

“How did she know my name?” Anathema muttered. 

“Oh, that’s Margaret,” he said. “Mary’s sister. Nothing happens here without one or both of them knowing.”

Well, that probably explained it. Anathema wasn’t sure if it was a small town thing, or just a Tongue thing; this whole matter of everyone knowing everyone’s business. 

“So, you just moved here, right?” he said, after taking a long sip of his drink. “How you finding it?”

Anathema nodded. “It’s nice. I was in Edinburgh before, it’s quite different.”

“I know what you mean - I lived in London for a while.”

She smiled and held out her hand, “I’m Anathema by the way.”

He shook her hand, and she could have sworn that behind his glasses, his gaze was calculating. 

“Call me Crowley.”

As he shook her hand, the sleeve of his jacket rode up slightly and she saw the dark point of a tattoo on his wrist, which she could have sworn looked like the tail of a snake. It was gone in a flash however, as he returned his arm to the table, so she may well have been imagining things. It did seem too perfect a coincidence. 

“So,” said Crowley. “Mary said she saw you hanging around with Adam Young and his gang of troublemakers.”

Anathema frowned, feeling defensive all of a sudden, “I wouldn’t call them troublemakers. Adam has lent me his sister’s old bike for getting around.”

Crowley held up his hands placatingly, “Oh I know, they’re just kids. But that’s what the likes of Mary and old Mr Tyler call anyone who goes around doing awful things like using their imagination.”

She allowed herself to relax a little, taking a slow sip of her gin. “They’ve been showing me around actually - yesterday they took me up to Coldbackie Beach. Have you been?”

“Not for a while. It’s rather beautiful, if I recall.”

“Oh definitely,” Anathema said. “There’s-” 

She cut herself off as Margaret came by to drop off her plate of chips. 

“As I was saying,” she continued, once Margaret was safely back behind the bar. “The beach was lovely, very peaceful. There’s an old sea cave there, which I must admit felt very eerie.”

She paused as she loaded up her chips with salt and ketchup. Then, she reached out to draw up some magic to lend an undercurrent of urging to her words. “If you haven’t been in a while, you should definitely check it out.”

She watched as Crowley paused, so briefly that it was almost imperceptible, then he gave a considering smile as he swirled his glass of whisky. 

“I may well do,” he said. 

He turned down her offer of a chip politely enough, though she did not miss the vaguely horrified look he gave the sauce-doused fries. Their conversation dwindled somewhat as she ate, mainly being further idle chatter about villages compared with city life, and as Anathema finished her food, Crowley excused himself with an offer to buy her a drink in return at some point soon. 

Anathema could only hope he took her hint and went to Coldbackie. She was sure she’d made the right decision in hopefully enlisting him in her research. Despite what the Them had said about the mafia, Anathema knew no-one malevolent would get such a dreamy yet excited look on their face when talking about how you could see the stars so clearly up here.


	6. V: Moorland

**V**

**Moorland**

_There’s a lot of moors around here. They’re rather beautiful in a desolate kind of way (most moors are), but not particularly interesting for the typical tourist. There are the ruins of several old crofting settlements, abandoned during the Highland Clearances, the best example of which will be covered independently in a later entry to this guide. Basically, a great thing to do for the history buff/anyone who wants to really cement their hatred of the aristocracy and see a further example of their long history of being awful. (For those who for some unfathomable reason like the aristocracy (or those who just have a very sensible love for architecture), they can go see Dunrobin Castle, about 50 miles north of Inverness. The name is accidental, though appropriate, as much of the 19th Century improvements that make the castle so admired today were built after the Sutherlands were done robbin’. Look, this is a guidebook, yes, but at no point does it promise not to get political/go into rants against immoral patriarchal overlords.)_

* * *

Crowley stood, near doubled over in the cave. 

“Fuck,” he said. “Fuck, fuckety fuck, fuck, shit, _arse!”_

He stared at the wall a few moments longer, blinking to make sure the crack didn’t disappear. 

It was still there, all lilac and ominous. 

“Fuck,” he said again.

Crowley did not make a habit of running, but he returned to the Bentley with a great degree of urgency before driving back to Tongue, ignoring the very concept of speed limits. 

* * *

Anathema busied around the village shop, picking up the wherewithal for sandwiches and a bottle of Irn-Bru. (She found she rather liked it, despite how unnaturally orange it was. Honestly, she could not taste the difference in the drink before and after its recipe change, but she nodded along with any complaints as to how the sugar tax ruined everything and avoided pointing out that they all still drank Irn-Bru anyway.)

She approached the till with a tight little smile and handed her shopping over to Stuart. The couple who ran the village shop were lovely, of course, but they were very chatty, which meant the process of actually purchasing your goods took about four or five or eight times longer than it should, depending on whether you were served by Marj, Stuart or both of them together. 

“Any plans for the day, young Anathema?” 

“Oh, you know, I was thinking about heading up to Scullomie or Skerray, do some more exploring.”

“Well you can’t go wrong for wildlife up that way,” Stuart said with a grin. Anathema smiled, but before she could get a word in, Stuart had carried on talking, as was his wont. “In fact, we just had old Dougal Robertson in here this morning. Lovely old fellow, he likes to come in early so he can get back to his cottage. You won’t have met him yet, since you seem to be more of a night-owl type, but he lives up just past Scullomie, old crofter he is, though he mainly just keeps a few chickens these days, since he had that knee replacement and all. Anyways, he says to me that he saw some strange lights out on the moor last night, and I says ‘Are you sure you weren’t just imagining it Dougal?’ and he says ‘No, I may be old, but I ain’t daft yet.’ He thought it may have just been some kids acting the goat, but then I asked why would anyone go out on the moors at night and he said he thought it was odd too or else he wouldn’t have mentioned it.”

“Well I’ll keep an eye out,” Anathema said, watching with mild horror as Stuart seemed to have stopped processing her shopping entirely as he told his story. She was honestly quite appreciative that information seemed quite so forthcoming here, but everyone seemed to parcel it up along with a lot of irrelevant anecdotes, especially the particularly...verbose, like Stuart. 

“Can I just say,” he started, finally scanning her loaf of bread, “That it’s great to see Adam and his lot helping you. They’re great kids, but it’s good for them to have something productive to channel their energy into.”

Anathema nodded, “They make great research assistants.”

She resisted the urge to sigh as he once again stopped in the process of lifting her pack of sliced cheese to the scanner. 

“You know, I’m sure there’ll be someone about who could lend you their car,” he continued. He scanned the cheese and Anathema withheld a cheer. “Then you could head out west - towards Durness. There’s some great examples of machair out that way.”

“That sounds like a good idea,” Anathema agreed, because she felt like she should actually know what machair was, if she was truly here researching local flora and fauna. (It was the best explanation she could think of when Mary had asked what she did. It at least made her strange hours, her general focus, and careening about the local area seem reasonable. It was better than her initial plan of saying she was on an extended walking retreat at least.)

As she headed back down the lane, she could already see the Them waiting outside Thistle Cottage. 

Pepper smiled at her in amusement. “Is Stuart on today?” she said, by way of greeting. 

Anathema sighed, “I just need to make our sandwiches up and then we can be on the way.”

The children all followed her inside, helping by filling her scuffed red tote bag with snacks and some bottles of water. 

“Actually,” she started, as she buttered a slice of bread, “Stuart did mention that someone was in this morning saying that he saw strange lights out on the moors.”

“That sounds like it might be Dougal,” said Wensley. 

Adam nodded, “Well we wanted to head that way anyway, so we should definitely check it out.”

Soon enough, they were all on the road that led north out of Tongue, keeping in single file on the worn tarmac as it wove along the contours of the hills, following the dramatic coastline. Even seeing it for the second time in a few days, Anathema found it no less spectacular than she had when she first saw it. 

As they neared Coldbackie, they rounded a corner and a large black car came into view, parked a little haphazardly on the small gravel lay-by. Anathema frowned at it - it looked vintage, well-kept and far too nice for a casual jaunt to the beach.

“Shit, isn’t that Mr Crowley’s car?” shouted Brian from somewhere behind her. 

Anathema smiled. He had listened to her after all. 

* * *

“I just don’t see why you felt the need to come blustering into my shop like that,” Aziraphale admonished through gritted teeth, as he clutched his seat, face pale. 

“It’s important,” said Crowley, eyes fixed on the road ahead. Aziraphale winced as he took a corner at great speed. 

“And why won’t you tell me what is so important?”

Crowley gripped the steering wheel tighter. “I told you; it’s better that you see it.”

Aziraphale gave a huffy little sigh, “Fine.”

The car was silent for a moment, save for the rapid drumbeats of some music Aziraphale didn’t recognise. 

“There were customers,” he muttered, a little petulantly and not quite under his breath, so Crowley definitely heard.

His hands just flexed once, twice, on the steering wheel. 

Aziraphale had been in the Bentley with Crowley before. Normally when he drove, he reclined back in his seat, arms as loose as his grasp of the Highway Code. However, today, it seemed like there was tension in every tendon, his jaw was clenched, his elbows were rigid, and Aziraphale got the distinct impression that were he not trying to seem relaxed, Crowley would be hunched over the steering wheel. 

As they sped along the coast, Aziraphale started to feel little seeds of worry sprout in his stomach, and it all stemmed from Crowley’s unusual behaviour. 

With barely a warning, or indeed a touch to the brake, he pulled into a large lay-by, kicking up a small flurry of stones. (They at least had the good sense not to scratch the paintwork.) 

The engine was still grumbling as Crowley all but leaped from his seat, leaving Aziraphale to scramble out of his door. 

“Aren’t you going to turn it off?” Aziraphale asked, following Crowley to the head of the path that lead downhill. It looked less like a path and more like some sand and stones that had been trodden into the grass. 

Crowley made a little hissing noise and snapped his fingers and the Bentley fell silent. Aziraphale followed him down, being careful to avoid the long grass that tugged at the light fabric of his trousers. It looked for all the world like Crowley had brought him to a beach, and Aziraphale for the life of him could not figure out what could be so urgent at a beach. 

Had Crowley not been such a roiling mess of anxiety, Aziraphale was certain he would have taken much more amusement from the sight of him struggling down the sand dune, all jerky hips, too long legs and snakeskin shoes with no grip at all. As it was, Aziraphale had barely cracked a smile before he too found himself contending with the slippery sand and an incline. 

He puffed, a touch out of breath as he reached the flat sand. Aziraphale glanced around a moment, confirming to himself that, yes, this was an ordinary looking beach, then he caught sight of Crowley, already some distance away, striding towards the looming cliffs to their left. 

The tide looked as if it was coming in, and Aziraphale hurried until he was only a few paces behind Crowley as he reached a rocky outcropping at the end of the sand. 

Aziraphale glanced around for something unusual and saw Crowley splashing determinedly through the water. 

He summoned a little magic and followed him around the rock, treading across the surface of the water. 

Crowley was once again off across the sand, wet denim clinging awkwardly to his calves. Aziraphale dried the fabric with a wave of his hands. 

“Thanks,” Crowley mumbled. He glanced back ahead, to the mouth of a cave. Aziraphale regarded it with some trepidation, for it certainly looked like the perfect location for something unsettling. 

Aziraphale cautiously stepped after him, over some rocks that stretched from the floor like jagged teeth and hunched down, careful not to snag his jacket on the wet rock. 

It did not take long for him to spot what had Crowley so worried. The demon had stopped at a certain point in the tunnel, eyes averted as if he did not quite want to acknowledge what was there. 

He held his hand up to the lilac split in the rock, a strange lack of feeling resonating in his bones. A familiar heat licked at his palm and everything went icy cold. 

Crowley still couldn’t look at it, but Aziraphale couldn’t look away. 

“It’s a stress fracture,” he found himself saying. “They must be trying to break through somewhere near here.”

“So, we did get the right place then.”

“So it would seem.”

“I’m rather fond of Tongue,” Crowley said. To anyone else, it might have seemed like a non sequitur, but Aziraphale just nodded. 

“Then we need to find another way to stop them breaking through.” As he said this, another wave of heat passed over the hand he still held to the crack and he pulled it away sharply. “Last time, well, it didn’t really work did it?” 

To Aziraphale’s relief, his forced calmness seemed to have dispelled some of the rigidity in Crowley’s frame such that he even attempted a wry smile at his comment. 

Aziraphale turned back towards the entrance, with the bluish glow of daylight beyond it. He was already brainstorming several books that could be of use to them. 

“Do you have any ideas, my dear?” he asked, glancing over his shoulder. 

Crowley didn’t reply for a moment, as he sighed, taking a breath to stand to his full height and flip his sunglasses back over his yellow eyes. 

“The witch,” he said at last. 

“Really?” Aziraphale said. “Have you spoken to her then?”

“Just the once,” said Crowley, “I think she might be researching this too; she did tell me to come to the beach.”

“Very well then,” he nodded, “We should see if we can get in touch with her.”

* * *

Anathema flopped down beside a patch of heather with a groan. No more than a few feet away, the Them echoed her movement. 

“I’m tired,” protested Wensley. 

“Me too,” said Brian, “This day has been pissing awful.”

“I have to say I agree,” Anathema said, wiping the sweat off her forehead. 

They had spent the whole afternoon combing the moorland near Mr Robertson’s house and all Anathema had to show for it was some new readings and a few minor burns from her magicometer. 

“We could try again at nighttime,” suggested Adam. “That’s when Mr Robertson saw whatever it was.” 

“True, said Pepper, “But I’m not sure our parents would let us come out here at night, even if we had a grownup with us.”

“We can find a way,” said Adam, “It is important research we’re doing after all.”

“How about trying for tomorrow?” said Pepper. 

“I think my parents might want to meet Anathema before that,” muttered Wensley. Would that be okay?” he asked her. 

Anathema had tuned out, her gaze fixed on the taut red skin on her hand and her thoughts firmly with Crowley and his friend and the crack in the cave.

“Hmm,” she said, “Oh that all sounds fine.” 

“Shit yes!” said Brian. “Sleepover!”

“Is it a sleepover, or is it camping?” mused Pepper. 

“Who cares?” said Adam, “We might get to see some aliens.”

“What makes you think they’ll be aliens on the other side?” Brian asked. 

“It’s a crack in reality - do you not remember in Doctor Who?”

The rest of the Them all nodded in agreement.

Wesley shuddered, “I hope they’re not like the SIlence.”

Pepper nodded, “Or the Angels, they were the scariest of all.”


	7. VI: Ben Loyal

**VI**

**Ben Loyal**

_Ben Loyal is not a Munro, leading to the hill being somewhat overlooked, since most people are in the habit of Munro-bagging. (Nearby we do have Ben Hope, though, which is the most northerly Munro.) Ben Loyal is, however, the most visually interesting of these mountains, with its four distinct peaks that dominate the surrounding landscape. After a misinterpretation of the myth of the Cailleach (Gaelic word often translated as ‘hag’), local teenager, Hamish Mackay, in 1740 started the rumour that Ben Loyal was in fact the remains of an ancient four-breasted giantess. If any immature local tells you this, ignore them, the mountain has never been considered to be a quadra-boobed folkloric creature._

* * *

Newton Pulsifer was a man who lived up to his name, as he found both it and himself to be awkward and uncomfortably English. Newton Pulsifer’s name was the most unusual thing about him. Once, he supposed, he had imagined himself doing fantastical things, being the next Steve Jobs or suchlike, but he lacked the talent and to a lesser extent, the ambition.

He had lived a normal life, the kind where he awoke at the same time each morning, regardless of if it was a Saturday or not. He wore variations of the same outfit each day. The most he did to instil a sense of whimsy in his attire was to wear the knitted Doctor Who tie his father had given to him sometime after he’d instilled a lifelong fear of Daleks in his son.

Newt was not a man of excess; he possessed neither extraordinary looks, nor extraordinary talent. He was, however, a nice man, and that is principally how he became involved in this story - he was too nice to know when to say no. 

He stepped out of the YHA’s staff room, smiling at Susie behind the reception desk. She was checking a pair of hikers into the hostel, so he just gave her a wave instead of stopping to say goodnight. 

He’d run out of pasta again, so he started towards the village shop, ready to pick up the wherewithal for cheese and baked bean pasta, a dish that always made Susie wrinkle her nose. 

As he approached the Ben Loyal Hotel, however, he found his feet changing direction and slowing down, though Marj and Stuart’s shop was still a little further down the road. 

Still, as he found himself at the doorway to the pub, he sighed. It couldn’t hurt to have one pint and something other than pasta to eat, not for one night at least. 

The important thing to understand about Newt was that he was not spontaneous in the slightest, in fact, were one to look in the dictionary, under ‘spontaneous,’ they might find a picture of Newt with the caption ‘Spontaneous, _adj,_ the exact opposite of this man, Newton Pulsifer.’ He’d had the same haircut since he was fifteen. He wasn’t even thirty yet, nor was he wealthy, and he already owned a tweed jacket. 

Newt had done exactly one spontaneous thing in his life, and even that had been a comparatively boring thing to do. One of his old work colleagues had handed in their notice one day and two weeks later they were on a plane to Australia, never to live in the UK again. 

Newt had never much fancied going abroad. His passport had expired shortly after his father had died and he’d never really got around to renewing it. In any case, the exotic locales that people tended to move to weren’t really the sort of place for Newt. So he’d stayed at home in Slough, but had started to take long weekends to go hiking in Wales and the Peak District. Eventually he’d worked his way up to Scotland and started to take in a Munro or so at a time. One summer, he came up to Tongue to take in Ben Hope and Ben Loyal. He had intended to stay a week, and that had been four years ago. 

So, for the first time in a long time, Newt was spontaneous, and he went and took a seat at the bar.

“Ahh Newt,” greeted Margaret, as she pulled a pint for Mr Robertson. “Don’t see you in here often. What can I get you?”

“Hello Margaret, can I get a pint and a menu please?”

She nodded, dropping a menu in front of him. Mr Robertson said something to her quietly as she handed over his pint, something Newt didn’t quite catch. 

His pint was placed in front of him, but Margaret shook her head before his hand even touched his wallet. 

“It’s taken care of,” she said, with a nod towards Mr Robertson. Newt frowned slightly, as he had never really spoke to him before, so he wouldn’t say he knew the old farmer at all. 

Newt eyed the man warily, but still found himself moving into a closer bar stool. 

“Thanks,” he said. 

Mr Robertson huffed, but it was a huff Newt could tell meant ‘you’re welcome.’ 

Newt found he had a habit of being conned into things by curmudgeonly old men. There was those six weeks between jobs in the summer of 2013, where he had been strong armed into joining the Witchfinder Army, of all things. It was quite patently ridiculous - after all, there was no such thing as witches. And anyway, Newt was too awkward to make it far enough into a conversation to ask how many nipples someone had without it being creepy. (With a stranger, there are very few natural conversational paths that can be taken for it not to be creepy to ask someone about their nipples.)

Mr Robertson then turned to Newt with the kind of polite smile that means someone is about to ask a favour of you. Newt started to wonder just what he had gotten himself into. 

* * *

It was raining, because of course it was raining. 

It was also some time past midnight. Newt wasn’t sure exactly when it was, because it was too dark for him to see his watch. Earlier, not long after the sky had darkened, he had turned on the torch he had to check what the time was. Mr Robertson had shouted out of the kitchen window at him, something about the lights. 

Newt still wasn’t entirely sure if the lights were even real. It sounded a bit strange really, lights on the moor. He would have wondered if it was kids, but that Adam and his lot weren’t really malicious enough to ride all the way out to Scullomie just to annoy old Mr Robertson. Anyway, for the past week or so, they’d barely caused any trouble at all, at least according to Margaret, ever since they’d taken to following that new, pretty American around. 

So there he was, in the rain, on a night too cold to be called summer by any reasonable human being, with no idea of what time it was, and no way to pass the time. That was the other problem with the rain, Newt found, other than the fact it had already soaked through his borrowed cagoule, he couldn’t see the stars. 

Across his lap sat the shotgun Mr Robertson had forced into his hands. Newt had never even held a gun before, and he certainly wasn’t going to fire it, ever, especially given how distinctly lacking in thoroughness Mr Robertson’s instructions had been. He wondered if he could perhaps club anything he might need a gun for with the handle of the gun. 

Newt shivered as a salty gust of wind whipped across the moor. The steady drizzle showed no sign of letting up. He wondered if he should perhaps head home to see his mum. She’d been up to visit once, two and a half years ago, but Newt himself hadn’t left Sutherland in four years. He’d thought about it many times, made plans in his head of weeks he could take off, but whenever it came to actually booking flights, it felt like there was something inside him that was holding him back.

(One time he’d even waited for the bus, but he did not get on it.

“Sorry,” he’d said, “Wrong bus.”

The driver had just frowned at him and had politely refrained from pointing out that there was only one bus that went through Tongue.)

Newt wasn’t sure what made him look up at first. There wasn’t a sound, or at least not one that could be heard over the rain, nor was there much light. 

There was definitely something across the moor, further up towards the abandoned crofting cottages. Newt stood up and began to approach slowly. The light was dim, too dim to have been from an artificial source, as they tended to pierce through the intense darkness up here like a knife to the eye. As he neared it, he began to doubt his assessment. Though the light lacked the yellow or blue-white tones that a torch would have, it was unlike any natural light Newt had ever seen. 

Even from this distance, it looked lilac. 

He crept softly and slowly across the wet grass, holding the shotgun by the barrel with both hands. A soft sound, like whispers, danced across his skin like the wind, tugging at the small hairs on his wrists and hands. He had a very horrible feeling that something definitely not-natural was happening. He felt under the cagoule to the lapel of his own coat and let out a sigh of relief. He wasn’t sure how useful it would be, but he still had his old Witchfinders pin. 

Before Newt could reach the source of the noise, the whisperings stopped and the lilac light started to dim. They’d almost completely faded, when Newt heard a voice. 

“Urgh, why does it have to be fucking raining?”

He turned on his torch. 

A few paces in front of him, stood a small dog with a big, wet nose. Newt shone his torch around; the owner hadn’t sounded too far away, but now there was no-one to be seen. 

He crouched down, holding out a hand to the dog. 

“Come here, little fella, where’s your owner, hey?”

“What the fuck?” barked the dog. 

Newt blinked. “You can talk?”

“Of course I can fucking talk!” said the dog. For some reason, unknown to Newt, they sounded like they were Mancunian. “Why shouldn’t I be able to talk?”

“Because you’re a dog?” said Newt. The surreal nature of the conversation hadn’t fully hit him yet. “Dog’s don’t tend to talk much, at least, they don’t tend to speak English.”

“What’s Eng-” the dog started to ask, then frowned. (Newt wasn’t sure dogs could frown, but it seemed like the expression their furry face was making.) “Wait, did you just say I’m a dog?”

The dog glanced down at their paws. 

“Oh for fuck’s sake.”

“Do you have a name?” asked Newt. 

“Sure,” said the dog, “My name is ~~𝜬𝝁𝜦𝜱𝜳~~ ~~.”~~

If it hadn’t been preceded by ‘my name is’, Newt was not sure he could even have identified what came from the dog’s mouth as sound. Gingerly, he lifted a finger to his ear and found it came away with blood on it. 

“Oh,” said the dog, “I forgot that you mortals couldn’t hear that. Call me ‘Dog.’ At least that avoids any confusion.” 

“I’m Newt,” he replied. He glanced back to the farmhouse, all it’s lights were off, but it loomed as a shadow in the darkness. With the peaks and valleys of its roof, it reminded Newt a little of the familiar shape of Ben Loyal. 

He looked back to Dog, “Want to come back with me? There’s a bit more shelter from the rain by the house.”

Dog looked around the black expanse of the open moorland. “Sure.”

Newt started back towards the house, using the dim light of the torch to pick his way back across the muddy earth, shotgun now held awkwardly under one arm. 

“What brings you here?” asked Newt, as Dog trotted along a few faces behind him. Then came that confused frown again. 

“I think I had a message to deliver,” they said. “But I can’t remember what the fuck it was.”

“What are you going to do then?”

Newt was fairly certain he’d never seen a dog shrug before, mainly because he didn’t think dogs could shrug. Then again, he’d also thought dogs couldn’t speak. 

Dog shrugged, “Find a human, maybe, I’ll figure something out.”

They arrived back at the house and Newt resumed his perch on the old lawn chair. Dog came and curled up on his lap. 

“I could help if you like,” said Newt, “I’m not sure they’ll let me keep you in the hostel where I work, but I think I know of someone in town who was looking to get a pet dog.”

Dog had their eyes closed, but they gave him a soft canine smile, “Thank you.”

* * *

Newt wasn’t aware of having fallen asleep, but he awoke the following morning to find Mr Robertson glaring warily at him through the lacy curtains of his kitchen window. Newt stretched, his body stiff and his clothes still damp from last night’s rain. In his lap, Dog whined, still snoozing and so Newt scooped them into his arms to carry them into the house. 

“Anything happen Newton?” asked Mr Robertson, looking pointedly at Dog. Newt could see that he had prepared a pan of warm porridge and left a towel on the back of a chair. According to the clock on the wall, it wasn’t yet seven. 

“I did see lights,” Newt said, “But when I approached them, I couldn’t see anything there, or what they were.”

Mr Robertson seemed to relax at that, “I’m not losing my marbles then. Good. And the dog?”

Newt scrabbled around in his head for something plausible. He didn’t think ‘they’re a talking dog and I think they came from in the lights’ was something Mr Robertson would want to hear, especially not about something Newt had brought onto his property. 

“No collar, so I think it’s a stray,” said Newt, “I found it walking near the lights, maybe it was drawn to them, whatever they were.”

Mr Robertson leant down to the still sleeping Dog and gently prodded a hindquarter before giving their coat a good sniff. 

“Seems like a normal dog to me,” he said.

Newt relaxed into his chair and wrapped his fingers around the hot mug of tea Mr Robertson had prepared for him. 

After breakfast, Newt took up Mr Robertson’s offer of a shower and some clean dry clothes before they headed back to Tongue. 

Back in the village, they said their goodbyes and Mr Robertson started off towards the shop whilst Newt headed back to the hostel with Dog in tow. 

At the desk was Vera, who came to the hostel every summer to work, each time assuming the position of de facto manager based on a combination of superiority in both age and pushiness. She gave him a look as he entered, nose wrinkled almost imperceptibly in distaste as she took in the long misshapen Fair Isle jumper and cord trousers, worn thin at the knees, held up with Newt’s own belt, which ended a good inch and a half above his ankle bone. 

“You look like you’ve had quite the night,” she said, by way of greeting. 

“Hi Vera,” Newt replied. 

Her eyes caught the figure of Dog as they appeared from behind his ankles. 

“Why have you brought a dog in here? You know dogs are only allowed on the campground.”

Newt sighed, “I found him out on the moors last night, I think he’s a stray. I just brought him with me whilst I change.”

“Well he can’t stay here.”

Newt found himself ignoring all his decades lived in a non-confrontational manner. 

“I’m well aware of that Vera, I’m going to find a place for them soon. I think the Youngs were looking for a dog. Either that or I could pass him on to that Mr Crowley - he has that pet snake after all and could probably home him temporarily, But first I’d like five minutes to change into my own clothes.”

As statements went, it wasn’t really confrontational, but by Newt’s standards, he felt like he’d just told her to ‘fuck off.’ In truth, Newt found Vera worked him up, he found she was too similar to him in all the worst ways; a rule stickler, a creature of habit - she had a whole wardrobe of fleeces from the nineties, all in the worst colour combinations possible - and just someone who didn’t really click with people. 

Shuffling into the staff quarters, what Newt had failed to notice was that Dog’s ears had perked up at the mention of Crowley’s name. 

* * *

At around half one, Newt realised that he had no food for Dog, nor had he any for himself since he had skipped out on going to the shop. 

“I’m not sure I even need food,” said Dog. 

All the same, Newt went to the Ben Loyal for lunch, ordering some egg and chips for himself, whilst Margaret went to fetch some water and dry food for Dog. From his table, he watched as the lunch customers slowly trickled away whilst he ate, until an even later diner than himself came in. It was that new woman to town. She offered him a sort of half-smile before she sat down at the table to his left and ordered a plate of chips. 

Newt kept watch of her out of the side of his eye as he sipped his way through his pint of coke. She wore a long and lacy black dress, despite the fact that after the rain last night, the day had turned out to be rather nice. Newt had even found himself sweating in his jacket as he took Dog for a walk. (Dog was certain they didn’t need a walk, but Newt wanted to be a responsible temporary owner of a supernatural hound.) Casually, he bent down to scratch Dog’s head, taking the opportunity to see how pointed her shoes were. (A little, but they were too rounded at the toe to be truly pointy.) Her attire was just enough, that he was questioning whether now, six years later, he had finally found himself a witch. Newt gave his head a gentle shake at his own ridiculousness. A talking dog was one thing, but witches? Magic? That was something else entirely. 

She was however, a researcher in animals, according to Mary, and she definitely knew Adam Young. Perhaps he could ask her to relay the information about Dog, or even take them in for a night or two. As Newt started to carefully plan his conversation, trying to think of the least awkward way to introduce himself to a stranger and then offer them a dog, and a talking dog at that, Anathema stood and paid at the bar. 

“Cute dog,” she said, with a smile that was more directed at Dog than it was at Newt. Then she left, and all of Newt’s conversational threads came to a crashing halt in his mind. 

Perhaps another plan then. 

* * *

It was somewhat fortunate that Newt had the day off, as Vera had essentially exiled him from the hostel. After lunch, he and Dog wandered around aimlessly, enjoying the warm feel of the sunlight on their faces after a night spent in the cold and the rain. 

It was about five o’clock, and Newt, his long night finally catching up to him, had sat down on his coat on the patch of grass in the centre of the village. Dog had been quiet all afternoon, though Newt wasn’t sure if that was just because of people being potentially within hearing distance. 

Adam and his friends came down on the road on their bikes, headed in the direction of Thistle Cottage. To his surprise, Adam slowed in front of him, hopping off his bike to join Newt on the grass. The girl - Pepper, was it? - followed suit, but the other two boys stayed with their bikes at the roadside. 

“Hey,” said Adam, plopping down onto the grass, “It’s Newt, right, you work at the hostel?”

Newt nodded, “How can I help you?”

“Well we were at the shop earlier today and Marj said that Mr Robertson said that you also saw lights on the moor.”

“I did,” Newt said, “And I found this little guy while I was there.” 

He gestured to Dog who huffed sleepily.

Pepper and Adam exchanged a look. 

Newt had no idea what it meant. He should also probably speak to the boy’s parents first, but well, it couldn’t hurt to mention it to Adam.

“I was hoping to speak to your parents about that,” he said. Adam turned to blink at him. “I can’t house a dog at the moment, but I heard that your parents were thinking of getting one.”

“Is it safe?” asked Pepper. 

“They’re very well behaved,” said Newt. “They’re also quite the character.”

Pepper frowned, “That’s a strange thing to say about a dog.”

“I’m not an ordinary dog,” said Dog. 

The children gasped. Newt withheld a sigh. 

“What’s your name?” asked Adam.

“Dog.”

The boy nodded, “Makes sense. A name like that avoids any confusion.”

Newt blinked, glancing between the two children in front of him, and the two a little further away, all of whom seemed to have adjusted to this development already. 

“If you don’t mind me saying,” he said, “You don't seem too surprised by this.”

Pepper wafted a hand, “We’ve had a weird week.”

“Can you come with us to Anathema’s?” asked Adam, “I think she might like to meet Dog.”


	8. VII: Eden

**VII**

**Eden**

_Look, I’m done writing about local properties. At least this one is more interesting than a cottage. Eden House, a name adopted by the Crowley family after the house became renowned locally for its incredible gardens, is a mid-century property, that is heavily inspired by Fallingwater and fits almost perfectly into the local scenery despite its modernity. Eden is located outside of the village and is not open to visitors, so it is honestly a mystery to me why I have been asked to include this in the guidebook._

* * *

Anathema blinked for a moment. In front of her the Them were crowded on her doorstep. This was not unusual. What was unusual was that they seemed to have brought a man and a dog. 

She blinked again. Nope, he was still there, looking at her owlishly through his glasses and clutching the small dog to his chest. 

Oh, she’d seen this man about before, in fact he’d been at the pub earlier. He’d spent the whole time either glancing at her or staring intensely at his pint glass, and Anathema had had a horrible feeling that he was nervous to talk to her because he wanted to ask her out. 

“We have news,” Adam announced, chest puffed up with pride. 

Anathema raised an eyebrow, but opened the door to Thistle Cottage wider to allow them in. As soon as the man crossed the threshold, Morag gave a shriek and a hiss, jumping down from the wooden bench seat to hide beneath it, until just her yellow eyes and the patch of white fur on her chest were visible in the shadow. 

The Them all crowded onto the bench seat, but the man looked to Anathema for permission before he set himself down gingerly in one of the chairs. 

“This is Newt,” said Adam. “And that’s Dog. You need to listen to them.”

Anathema chuckled as she sat down. “You called your dog ‘Dog.’”

Newt shook his head, “I didn’t call them that. Dog did.”

“I can speak,” said Dog, hopping up onto the table. “Apparently that is weird.”

Once you have seen a crack in the fabric of reality itself, you sort of skew your barometer for the bizarre, so beyond a twitch of the eyebrows, Anathema did not react to this new development. 

“That is a little strange,” she agreed. 

“Mr Robertson asked me to watch last night, in case there were lights again,” Newt said. “And there were, so I went to investigate, and I found Dog.”

“What were the lights like?” Anathema asked. 

“They weren’t very bright,” said Newt, “Oh and they were sort of lilac.”

At that, the four children all looked to Anathema with wide eyes and so she took a steady breath. Lilac was… lilac was not good. 

“Dog,” she started, in a gentle tone, “Do you know how you got here?”

Dog shook their head, “I can’t remember, and the more time passes, the foggier it gets.”

“When I first found them, they said they had a message they couldn’t remember,” said Newt. 

Dog frowned, “Now I can’t even remember that.”

“Can you remember anything?” she asked. 

“All I remember is a bright, hot light, then the cold, the damp, and the dark. Oh, and a name - Newt said the name of someone and I recognised it.”

“Who?”

“Crowley.”

* * *

If you ever asked him, he would never admit it, but amongst the greenery and the clean architecture of his house, Crowley had a library - a small library - but a library all the same. In it, there were volumes on astronomy, on motoring, and on botany, there was a not inconsiderable collection of well-thumbed science-fiction novels. There was also a series of papers, still intact after many centuries, as if they had not dared to rot away, despite not being carefully kept for most of their lifetime.

Crowley had spent all night poring over these papers. It had taken a while, but he’d remembered mostly how to decipher both the Sumerian and the few words in a language they’d translated into Cuneiform. (Well Azirphale had, Crowley had just been there at the time.) These words were in a language humans could not comprehend, and in fact there were a few spots of blood on one sheet from a man in the nineteenth century who’d tried to read it, until his sanguine tears had obscured his vision completely. 

These were the notes he and Aziraphale had made the last time. 

Through the house, the loud ring of a bell sounded and Crowley shot up in his chair. 

There was someone at the gate.

He left the library, waving a hand to close the door so it blended into the light stonework of the wall. As he approached the front door, he reached out to test the magical signature. It wasn’t Aziraphale. It was, however, vaguely familiar. 

The video display showed a group of five, all on bikes. Ah, Anathema then - he’d been thinking of contacting her after he was done with his reading. And she had brought the four children too. And a dog, which was new. 

He pressed the button that opened the gate and stepped through the front door to await them on the porch. Crowley had no idea what time it was; it was still bright out, but the sun had sunk low enough in the sky to cast the tree-lined driveway into shadow. Anathema and the children rounded the curve on their bicycles and dropped them to the ground a few feet from the steps. 

“Anathema, Adam, Pepper, Brian, Wensley,” he greeted. “Why are you here?”

“An explanation,” said Anathema firmly. “Or help, whatever, I think you might know what’s going on.”

“This is about the crack?”

She nodded, “Yes, well, the cracks, there’s a second one on the moors somewhere,” she gestured to the small dog at her feet, “Dog came through it.”

Crowley looked down at the dog, it nodded. A tendon in his jaw tensed. 

“Well then,” he said, “I think you had better come inside.”

* * *

Anathema frowned as Crowley and Dog re-entered the room. 

“Why did you have to leave for Dog to tell you their other name?” asked Pepper. 

“When I told Newt my name, his ears bled,” said Dog. 

“Infernal does that,” Crowley gestured vaguely around his head, “Mortals can’t comprehend it. Written form makes their eyes bleed.”

Dog cocked their head, “I didn’t know there was a written form.”

“Aziraphale found a way to transcribe Celestial and Infernal in Cuneiform back around 3000 BC.”

“Impressive,” said Dog. 

Anathema, who found the whole conversation increasingly surreal, shook her head before speaking. 

“I’m sorry, did you say _Infernal?_ As in Hell?”

Dog shrugged.

“Yes, well, no, well,” Crowley sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “This would be a lot easier to explain if Aziraphale was here.”

“I could go get him,” offered Pepper. 

“She could,” said Adam. “Pepper’s the fastest rider, she could go and get Mr Fell in a jiffy.”

“It’s okay,” said Crowley, “I can go.”

He clicked and disappeared with a quiet pop. After a moment he reappeared with a dishevelled-looking Aziraphale. 

The blond man huffed, promptly collapsing into a nearby chair. 

“You know I hate travelling that fast, it makes me dizzy.”

“Sorry,” said Crowley, who had moved to slouch against the wall. “It is important.”

“There’s a second crack,” said Anathema, “And Dog seems to have come through it.”

Aziraphale froze. 

“Dog’s Infernal,” Crowley added. 

“And we’d like to know what that means,” Anathema said. 

Aziraphale sighed. 

“Well,” he said, “It all starts in the world on the other side of those cracks, with an event known as The Sundering.”

“Aziraphale,” Crowley interrupted in a gentle tone, “I think we can summarise that part.”

“Right,” he said, “Yes. Well, I suppose I should start by saying that Crowley and I, and Dog too, of course, we all come from that other reality. There used to be an opening near the Middle East, many years ago and that is where we came through.

“But long before then, there was a split in our religion that was led by a reformer called Lucifer who questioned the Metatron and their connection to God. In fact, a lot of our religion was passed on to Christianity in your world - the Metatron is rather like the Pope, you see- and I’m getting off track. So this split caused the people of our world to be given two separate names when they came to yours; Angels,” Aziraphale gestured to himself. “And Demons.” 

Crowley gave a little wave. 

“Celestial and Infernal are just dialects of the same language,” added Crowley. 

“What happened to the crack in the Middle East?” asked Anathema. 

Aziraphale and Crowley exchanged a look. 

“It closed in the seventeenth century,” said Aziraphale. 

“It was for the best,” said Crowley, “They were causing a lot of havoc. Aziraphale and I just ended up on the wrong side of the crack when it closed.”

Aziraphale gave Crowley another look out of the side of his eye. There was something they weren’t saying, but Anathema decided to ignore it for now, as all this new information was already giving her a headache. 

“And you think they’re trying to open up another entry to our world?”

“It would seem so.”

Anathema glanced to the children to find them all staring, rapt, at Aziraphale and Crowley. Wensley had even taken out his notebook to add information, but had donated it to Pepper so she could draw a diagram of a crack, flanked on one side by a group of stick figures and on the other by a mass of stick figures with either wings or horns and curly tails. 

“I’ve remembered something,” said Dog. “I remember why I know your name Crowley.”

Crowley went rigid against the wall. “Oh really?”

“Someone on the other side was looking for you.”

“Ah,” he gulped. “Shit.”


	9. VIII: Sletell

**VIII**

**Sletell**

_If you are unable to arrange a trip out to Eilean nan Ròn, then do not fear, for abandoned settlements set in picturesque moorlands are still available to you. After a bracing walk across coastal moors, Slettel heaves into view, it’s few remaining houses, roofs open to the elements stand amongst the heather and the rocky green terrain, forming a slightly sorrowful foreground to the incredible landscape, with Eilean nan Ron and the Rabbit Islands breaking out from the sea. Under a cloudy sky, it is beautiful, but catch it in the right lighting, with golden rays of sun breaking through the clouds and the view transforms itself into something magnificent and otherworldly._

* * *

It was nearing nine o’clock and the evening was still and clear. The sky was just starting to darken, but Anathema could still read the map, spread out on the tartan blanket in front of her. 

Aziraphale, who had provided the blanket - or rather, summoned the blanket - was sat beside her, looking intently between Anathema’s map of the Kyle, and one of the ley lines in Scotland. 

“So if you follow the line of this crack,” he said, tracing his finger across the paper, “And the crack in Coldbackie, it follows the ley line.”

“Would that have any effect on their ability to get through?” asked Anathema. 

“Perhaps.” 

Aziraphale went back to looking at the map. 

Anathema dug into her notes and turned to the page where she had written down the Nutter Prophecy. Aziraphale had referred to the split between the angels and demons as the Sundering. Though she still wasn’t certain about what the Serpent was. She had thought Crowley, but now she had not seen anything to confirm or deny it. At his home, she hadn’t even seen his supposed pet snake. 

“It does fit,” she muttered to herself, as she jotted down ‘Angels and Demons’ underneath ‘the Sundered’ on the page. 

“What fits?”  
“The Nutter Prophecy,” she replied. She showed Aziraphale the page in her notes, “The lines are the ley lines, the Sundered, that could be the Angels and Demons, Tongue I think is obvious, and the Serpent, well Adam mentioned something about Crowley having a pet snake.”

Aziraphale chuckled, “My dear, Crowley doesn’t have a pet snake, Crowley is a snake.”

“What do you mean?”

“Crowley,” Aziraphale called to his friend, who was leant against one of the old stone walls, staring off at the horizon. “Would you care to show Anathema your other form?”

Crowley sighed, and there was a slight popping sound, and then there was a large black snake in the grass. 

“What the shit?” cried Brian.

Dog looked up from their belly rub, “I can’t do that!”

“But you can talk,” said Adam, giving them a consoling pat on the head. 

“It takesssss a while,” hissed Crowley. 

“Can you turn into an animal Mr Fell?” Pepper asked. 

Aziraphale shook his head, “I’m afraid not, and I can’t really show you my other form, it tends to end badly for humans.”

Crowley slithered over to the group of children. 

“There’sssss a lot of eyessssss. It’ssssss horrifying.”

“Thanks,” said Aziraphale flatly. 

Anathema and Aziraphale went back to their studies and so Crowley decided to join the children as they kept watch over the crack in the moorland. 

“So,” said Pepper, in an innocent tone that Crowley knew meant trouble. “You’re Pete then.” 

“Yesss.”

“You ran away from us when we were playing with you,” said Wensley.

“You were going to throw me in a pond.”

“That’s fair,” said Brian, “I don’t think I’d like to be thrown into a pissing pond.”

“How come you’re always by the bookshop?” Pepper asked. 

Crowley chose to ignore that one.

“Ssssso Brian,” he said, “I think I sssshould teach you how to ssssswear properly.”

Aziraphale looked up from the blanket to glare at Crowley. 

“Absolutely not.”

“Angel, he already knowssss all the wordssss,” Crowley replied, “He jussst needsss to know the art of how to ussse them effectively.”

Aziraphale groaned and turned back to Anathema. 

“I’m sorry about this,” he said to her, as Crowley started to address his class of four (and Dog, but Dog could already swear).

“The Art of Ssssswearing, Lesssson One, Fuck: the Most Versatile Word in the English Language.”

Anathema just laughed and gave Aziraphale a knowing smile.

“It’s okay,” she said, “Now, do you know anything about that island?”

Aziraphale followed her finger to the island just to the North. 

“Ahh,” he said, “That’s Eilean nan Ròn, that means Island of Seals I believe.”

“Well the ley line, just misses it, but it couldn’t hurt to go and investigate there, right?”

“Hmm,” he said, “Crowley and I know someone who lives there.”

Anathema frowned down at her map, “It says here that it’s uninhabited.”

“It is uninhabited. By humans.”


	10. IX: Eilean nan Ròn

**IX**

**Eilean nan Ròn**

_The name translates from Gaelic to Seal Island, which is so incredibly appropriate as now the island is mainly inhabited by seals (also seabirds and sheep). The seals come to the island to pup. If you can arrange a boat tour to the island, it is well worth a visit, as you can see the ruins of the old farmhouses that have remained untouched since the last nine inhabitants were evacuated from Eilean nan Ron in 1938. My editor has asked me to kindly refrain from any further rants regarding the Clearances and the Sutherland family, so that is all I am going to say on the matter. Instead, let us just consider cute seal pups. Aww._

* * *

“Look,” said Crowley, “I’m happy to go over there, but I’m just not sure that they’ll want to speak to us.” 

“Well it can’t hurt to try,” said Aziraphale. He sounded calm, but Anathema could see he had a white knuckle grip on his seat in the front. She didn’t blame him, Crowley’s driving was terrifying. Poor Wensley looked green. Even Adam looked subdued, and had done ever since the Bentley had taken a sharp corner on two wheels. Fortunately, Crowley had slowed down as they entered the loose grouping of houses that formed Skerray, muttering to himself as he tried to recall the route down to Skerray Bay. Strictly speaking, there wasn’t enough room in the back of the Bentley for four children, a dog and a fully grown adult, but Crowley had convinced the car that there definitely was enough space, so they all had the honour of experiencing his driving. 

“I wish we could have just used our bikes,” Pepper muttered under her breath.

“I’ll be fucking glad when we get there,” said Brian. 

Crowley grinned sharply, looking at them in the rear-view mirror, “You can walk, if you like.”

Aziraphale gave him an admonishing pat on the arm, then smiled weakly at the six of them in the back, “Don’t worry, we’re almost there.”

Sure enough, Crowley took a final turn and the deep blue of the sea peeked above the rocky landscape. 

By some miracle, they found an old fisherman almost immediately after they had parked who was willing to lend them his boat for the day. Anathema smiled as they left the mainland behind. She could feel the salt in the air as they rushed across the short stretch of sea. Even with Crowley driving, the trip by boat was much smoother than the car. The Them had joined him up by the helm and laughed at something he said. 

“The Art of Swearing, Lesson Three,” he shouted over his shoulder. 

Aziraphale groaned, but the sound of it was lost to the wind. 

“Call a Fuckwit a Fuckwit: How to Insult People.”

* * *

Though Anathema could see the ruins of a long-abandoned settlement on Eilean nan Ròn, there was no real harbour to speak of, so Crowley slowly started to circle the island, searching for a place to anchor the boat. As they passed a bay to the northeast of the island, she could see that it was filled with grey animals. 

“Are those seals?” she asked. “I know you said it was called the Island of Seals or something, but still, I didn’t expect that many.”

“They come here to pup in the summer,” Aziraphale said. He raised his voice to call to Crowley, “Is there somewhere near here we could stop?”

Anathema frowned, “Are we going to talk to a seal? As in like a seal demon.”

“Sort of.”

The boat started to slow down, as Crowley pulled it closer to the beach, and into the smoother waters of the bay. He turned off the engine and waved a hand to drop the anchor. 

“Might it be easier to get them to come to us?” he said to Aziraphale. 

Aziraphale nodded, “If we disturb the seals too much, they might get angry.”

Crowley went to the side of the boat that faced the beach and shouted into the wind. 

“Ezekiel!”

Anathema watched as one of the seals, a large one that looked as if it was keeping watch, dived from a rock and into the water. 

Aziraphale smiled, “They’re coming over.”

The seal surfaced beside the boat, fixing Crowley with a glare.

“What do you want?”

“We need to speak to you,” said Aziraphale. 

“I know,” said Ezekiel. “Is it important?”

“There’s another opening,” said Crowley. 

They disappeared beneath the surface of the water for a moment, then reappeared, launching themselves upwards and onto the boat. As they landed, their seal form dropped away like a coat, then vanished, leaving a grey-skinned humanoid figure crouched on the deck. 

“Where?” they asked, gaze flicking between Aziraphale and Crowley.

“North of here.”

“Not the Faroe Islands,” Anathema clarified, “They’re not on the right ley line, but there’s no other island we can see.”

Ezekiel then seemed to notice the humans on the boat, and they turned their dark eyes to study them for a moment. They locked eyes with Adam for a long pause, then turned back to Aziraphale and Crowley.

“You brought humans along?”

“We’re helping each other,” said Aziraphale. “Anathema has been researching the cracks.”

Ezekiel cocked their head to the side, “They’re trying to break through?”

Crowley nodded. 

“Is it angels or demons?”

“We don’t know for certain, but it seems to be demons.”

“Well, that doesn’t really matter to me, I suppose,” they said. “I do not wish to go back. And I can help with your problem.”

“How?”

Ezekiel turned their gaze to the sea. “There is an island, beyond here, we seals avoid it, for it feels… wrong. I do not think humans can find it, but I could lead you there.”

Crowley nodded, “That would be of great help.”

“I still do not know about the opening I came through,” they added. “So I cannot help you there. Do you have a new way to close the rift?”

“I think I might have an idea,” said Crowley. 

“Good,” their tone was sharp, almost cruel, “Let us hope it is better than last time, you do not want eighty thousand to die again.”

“Eighty thousand?” Anathema whispered to herself. Just behind her, she heard Aziraphale drop heavily onto the boat’s wooden bench. 

Adam clenched his fists, “What the fuck did you two do?”

“They closed the opening,” Ezekiel said, not addressing their response to any of the group in particular. 

“There was an earthquake,” Crowley said tightly. 

Ezekiel heaved a sigh, eyes scanning over the quiet group before them. They started to move their hands around one another in tight circles, creating something seemingly from the salt in the air. After a moment, Ezekiel held out their palm, and a small, thin whistle, pearl white in colour, dropped into their hand. They held it out to Crowley. 

“Use this when you wish to head to the strange island. I imagine you will want to act fast. I can keep the seals calm, but the other wildlife has noticed that something is amiss.”

Crowley gave a stiff nod as his hand closed around the whistle. Ezekiel bowed their head to each of them in turn, then leapt over the rail of the boat, re-entering the water as a seal. 

With a flick of his wrist, Crowley hoisted the anchor, heading back to the helm with his back held in a rigid line. 

Anathema sat down next to Aziraphale as he stared unseeingly at the floor. 

“We didn’t think there would be an earthquake,” he said quietly, “Especially not one so devastating.”

“Where was it?”

“Near Shamakhi, it’s in Azerbaijan.”

“You and Crowley closed the opening?”

“I think that was the problem; there was only two of us, so we each took a side and we tried to force it shut.”

She placed a hand on his shoulder.

“There’s more of us, so there’ll be another way to close it,” she paused, “Is there a way of filling the hole?”

Aziraphale gave his head a small shake. “Nothing physical could fill it, as it would just fall through to the other side.”

Brian perked up, “So you need like supernatural polyfilla or something then?”

“There’s no such thing as supernatural polyfilla Brian,” Pepper muttered.

“I didn’t fucking say that,” he frowned. “But Anathema and Mr Crowley and Mr Fell are really smart, I reckon they could invent something like that.”

Anathema and Aziraphale just exchanged a worried look, before Aziraphale turned his gaze up to the stiff figure of Crowley, alone at the helm. 

He hoped he actually did have an idea.


	11. X: Eilean nan Taibhsean

**X**

**Eilean nan Taibhsean**

_Why on Earth am I being asked to write an entry for a place that does not exist? Not even Tongue locals believe in this one, that’s how far-fetched a rumour Eilean nan Taibhsean is. A phantasmal island, really?_

* * *

Anathema’s alarm cut through the silence like a knife. She groaned, but pulled herself from her bed, tiptoeing across the carpet to grab a jumper on her way downstairs. Before she took the first step, she paused, and stepping back, she poked her head into the first guest room to find Wensley and Brian both fast asleep. From the room across the hall she could just about hear the murmurs of either Pepper or Adam. 

The soft grey light of predawn was filtering through the window, casting shadows across the silent faces of Aziraphale and Crowley as they sat at the table. Before them sat mugs of drinks that had long since cooled. Neither moved as Anathema took the cups away, and put the kettle on to boil. One by one, the children appeared, fully-dressed, but yawning in the doorway to the kitchen. Everyone was quiet, weighed down by the sleepiness of the early morning, and they drifted through Thistle Cottage as they prepared for the day ahead. 

Anathema stepped outside into the chilly air and pulled her coat tighter around her with one hand. In the crook of her other arm, Morag let out a small screech in protest as the movement jostled her. To her right, the lamppost was still lit, its orange light flickering feebly against the gloomy sky. She tried to blink some of the tiredness away, but to no avail. 

The Bentley cut silently through the stillness. Crowley drove more carefully than on their last trip to Skerray, his mood still subdued after their meeting with Ezekiel. Soon enough, they pulled up beside the small pier. 

There was no-one around. They all climbed onto the same boat as they had used before. This time, the children all crowded into the small cabin below deck, sleeping bags in tow, eager for the chance to get more sleep. Aziraphale also ventured down, a book tucked under his arm. 

The upper cabin housed the steering, and Anathema joined Crowley in there, as it was more sheltered from the cold than the deck. Even so, her bone-deep tiredness mixed with the overcast weather made her begin to shiver. 

With a click of his fingers, Crowley instantly enveloped her in a feeling of warmth and she relaxed. 

“Thanks,” Anathema said. 

“Just wait until winter,” he said. “I have it on the go almost all the time.”

The warmth also enveloped Morag, who gave a contented purr from her seat on Anathema’s lap. Her part in the navigation was not yet needed, so Anathema allowed herself to doze off in the chair as Crowley headed for Eilean nan Ròn. 

* * *

There was a gentle thud, as Ezekiel landed on the deck, and Crowley gave a tight smile to greet them. They nodded slowly in return, shivered, and flicked their hand up, immediately transforming back into a seal.

“How do you cope with no insulation?” they asked. 

Crowley shrugged, “I’m a snake who lives in Scotland, I’m always cold.”

Ezekiel made a move towards the cabin, seemingly forgetting their seal form. They sighed as what was intended to be a step became a sort of shuffle. 

“You should wake the witch,” Ezekiel said, “We’ll need to follow the ley lines first.”

Crowley nodded, tapping Anathema lightly on the shoulder as he made his way back to the helm.

“You awake?” he asked quietly. 

Anathema made a sleepy, unintelligible noise, but did not open her eyes. Just as Crowley lifted his hand to shake her shoulder, Morag leaned up and batted Anathema on the nose with her paw. 

The young woman groaned, eyes still shut. “Go away,” she muttered. 

Morag screeched. 

Anathema glared blearily down at the cat.

“Alright, I’m awake.”

Morag leapt down to the floor. Slowly, Anathema stood, burrowing down into her wool coat. She made her way outside to the deck, though the cat did not follow. For a moment, she eyed the bench over to the left, but instead she sat cross-legged on the floor, at the boat’s centre. 

Ezekiel resumed their human form, walked three steps to sit down beside her, then immediately returned to their seal skin. 

Anathema raised an eyebrow at them, “You’re not a fan of that human form are you?”

The seal shrugged, “I’m not a fan,” they paused on the word, as if it was new, “Of humans. They pollute my home.”

Anathema smiled sadly, “I’m sorry about that.”

Ezekiel shrugged again, “It’s not your fault.”

Morag then trotted over, having somehow persuaded Crowley to open the door for her. She gave Ezekiel a disinterested sniff, then dropped into Anathema’s lap. Absentmindedly, Anathema’s hand began to give her a gentle scratch behind the ears as she kept talking. 

“Funnily enough, Adam’s mother told me that the four of them staged an Extinction Rebellion protest at the school. There’s only twenty of them in the whole school, but they still all gathered in the village centre.”

Ezekiel did not say anything, but they did smile. Anathema nodded to herself, satisfied, then set about her work. She closed her eyes so she could focus as she searched for the ley line. At this point in her life, finding ley lines was second nature to Anathema, but there was a marked difference between sitting still on land and finding one whilst moving on the water. Slowly, she inhaled a salty breath, and as she exhaled, she reached out with her magic until… there. 

“A little more to the right,” she called to Crowley, who in turn corrected their course. 

“You,” Ezekiel said, “You are deeply connected to the Earth’s magic, yes?”

“Well, I am a witch, so yes.”

“That may prove helpful,” they said. “I presume you know how to tether magically?”

“Yes.”

“Keep Crowley on course, when we get closer, you can tether your magic to mine and I can lead you to the island. Crowley can do it, too.”

“What is the island like?” she asked. 

“Cold,” said Ezekiel, “But not a normal cold, a supernatural cold.”

“Does it have a name?”

“In the old times, back when people still used to live on Eilean nan Ròn, they used to have a name for it, for the island that would sometimes appear in the distance, but could never be reached; Eilean nan Taibhsean.”

“And what does that mean?”

Ezekiel narrowed their eyes in thought, “I’m afraid I can’t remember how to translate very well.”

The day passed slowly, as the boat chugged on through the water. As they moved further and further away from the mainland, the fog grew thicker, eventually isolating them such that it barely felt like they were moving at all. Anathema kept her hold on the ley line, occasionally calling out corrections to Crowley for the steering. 

At one point, Adam emerged with a flask, which he handed to Anathema. It was filled with hot chocolate, that slid smoothly down her throat, then its heat spread all the way to her extremities. 

“Thanks,” she said, with a smile.

“Aziraphale made it,” said Adam, glancing around. “It’s super creepy out here.”

“Very,” she agreed. “Say Adam, you speak some Gaelic, right?”

He nodded, “Learnt it at school.”

Anathema gestured to Ezekiel, who looked up from playing with Morag, drawing their flipper away. 

“The island where we’re going used to be called Eilean nan Taibhsean.”

Adam frowned, biting his lip, “Taibhse is ghost I think, so it would be like Island of Ghosts?”

Ezekiel bowed their head slightly, “Thank you.”

Adam looked to Anathema, “You don’t mind if I head back inside, do you? Wensley and I were going to play Top Trumps.”

She smiled, “Go ahead, there’s not much happening out here yet.”

* * *

At some point in the afternoon, Crowley started to veer sharply off course, though he was still directing the boat straight. Anathema frowned. 

“Ezekiel,” she called. 

They looked up sharply, “We’re close.”

Anathema nodded, moving to join Crowley at the helm. 

“Is it time?” he asked, adjusting a lever on the controls so the boat started to slow.

Ezekiel returned to their human form for ease in jumping over the boat’s railing, resurfacing as a seal just beyond the bow. 

Anathema reached with her magic, and beside her she could feel Crowley do the same, until she found the rough, raw energy that clearly belonged to Ezekiel. In silence, the boat crawled forward through the fog. Leaning forward on the wheel, Crowley pulled his sunglasses down on the bridge of his nose and his eyes combed the swirling vapour for any sign of land. 

There was nothing. 

And then, suddenly it loomed, a great hulking shadow that overwhelmed their tiny fishing boat, an island of sheer black cliffs and bone white trees. Cold dread settled at the base of Anathema’s spine. The hands on her watch started to spin, faster and faster until they stopped and the glass cracked. 

“Well,” said Crowley, pushing his glasses back up to fully cover his eyes, “I’d say we’re here.”

Ezekiel began to tug them over to a gaping maw in the cliff face, which soon lead to a small sea loch, its water dark and unfathomable. 

“Why are you here?” boomed a deep voice. Ezekiel let out a startled cry, Morag screeched and dove into Anathema’s bag. 

A figure, seven foot tall with sickly green skin appeared on the deck. They glared. 

“Humans should not enter here.”

They started to float towards the door of the cabin. Then, they stopped, frowning, as they focused on Crowley. 

“You are not all human,” they said, voice dropping. 

“Aziraphale!” Crowley shouted. 

He appeared instantly on the deck, fixing Crowley a worried look, before he spotted the figure. 

“Ahh,” he said, “Hello.”

The figure said nothing. 

“Aziraphale and I, and Ezekiel,” Crowley gestured vaguely to the water, “We’re from a different world, that’s trying to break through.”

The figure seemed to relax at that, their form shrinking down a few inches. 

“Oh, you’re here for _that_ opening. Are you intending to go through, or to close it?”

“Close it,” said Crowley firmly. 

The figure smiled, revealing rows of cracked and yellowed teeth. 

“Excellent,” they said, “Allow me to show you the way.”

The boat was suddenly at a shoreline, tied to a rotting pier of pale wood.

The figure floated at the end of the pier, their skin glowing slightly in the gloom. Slowly, their odd little group disembarked. Crowley and Aziraphale led the way, followed by Anathema, Morag still hidden in the depths of her satchel, the four children brought up the rear, huddled together in their anoraks and looking nervously about. Dog cowered in Adam’s coat, their furry ears just poking out to tickle his neck. Ezekiel stayed in the water. 

The figure dropped down to the ground, transforming into a spectral horse as they did so. There was a path cut into the rock that rose steeply, only wide enough to allow for single file. Aziraphale glanced around from his place behind Crowley, eyes trying to focus on the dark shapes that loomed in the fog.

“What is this place?” he murmured. 

“The Island of the Dead,” the horse said. 

They fell silent for a moment, then sighed to themselves. 

“You must forgive me,” they said, “I’m not used to visitors. I’m Pestilence.”

“Pestilence as in one of the four Horsemen, that Pestilence?” Crowley said, eyebrow raised. 

“What are the Horsemen?” called Wensley from the back. 

“Humans know me as one of the Horsemen of the Apocalypse, but I’m mostly retired these days. And the Apocalypse hasn’t happened yet.”

Pepper frowned and clenched her fists, “Did you kill people?”

“Common misconception that, we just help Death with the collection of souls. I’m not needed as much now - modern medicine and all - so I tend to just stay here.”

“What do you do?” 

“Keep watch,’ they said, “But it’s very boring, so I got Pollution to bring me a laptop a few years back and now I just tend to watch Youtube and play Fortnite.”

“I want to play Fortnite,” said Brian, “But our Internet is too slow.”

As they reached the top of the slope, the fog thinned slightly, and Adam could see further across the dark rocks, to a greenish glow in the distance. 

“What’s that?” he asked, pointing. 

“That’s what I’m here guarding,” said Pestilence, “That’s an opening to the Land of the Dead. Please don’t go over there. You’ll die.”

Wensley gulped and Brian kept his eyes fixed in the opposite direction to the green light. 

They carried on across the barren landscape.

* * *

When they found it, Anathema was honestly surprised at how small the opening was, considering the magical signature it had been emitting. It was about a foot across, and not quite three feet in length, filled with that swirling lilac light. A shadow flickered in the light, in the shape of a humanoid figure with many, many wings. 

“ ** ~~ℏ𝝷𝛪𝛬𝛬𝜱𝚥ℂ~~** ** ~~!~~** **”**

The voice split through the air, stabbing into Anathema’s ears like a knife and she bent double, hands clasped to her head. 

“There are humans here!” Crowley shouted at the crack. “Be careful.”

There was a moment of pause. 

“You do not sound pleased to hear us,” chorused the voices.  
(Now that her ears weren’t bleeding any longer, Anathema could hear them a little more clearly.)

“I’m not,” said Crowley simply. 

“But we’re coming to rescue you.”

“I’m not in need of rescuing!” he shouted. 

“But you’ve been trapped since the accident.” Anathema did not know it was possible for a multitude of voices all speaking at once to all sound confused. “For four hundred years, and with that bastard Aziraphale.”

Aziraphale coughed, “Right here.”

He was ignored. 

“So you do not wish to return?”

“No.”

There was a sigh that sounded like a swarm of flies. 

“Aziraphale,” the name was spat out, like a curse, “Your side wish me to address you, too. Do you wish to cross over?”

“I most definitely do not.”

“Fine, stay with the humans. Crowley, we will leave this gateway open, in case you change your mind.”

With that, the shadowy figure in the rift receded. 

All fell silent. 

“Well,” Crowley said with a laugh, “That was anticlimactic.”

“All this time, we thought we were in trouble,” said Aziraphale breathily. “And they just thought we were trapped.”

Pestilence gave a small cough, “I’m afraid we’re still going to have to close up that hole. I’m not sure this island is big enough to hold two openings. Also, to be quite frank, your lot made a lot of work for us back in the day and humans are bad enough on their own.” 

“It’s a bit less urgent now,” said Aziraphale, “So hopefully we can find a way that works.”

“I do still have an idea,” said Crowley. He smiled at Aziraphale’s expectant look. “What do you always say is the most powerful thing about humans?”

Aziraphale gasped, “Oh, excellent!”

Anathema frowned, “What is it?”

“Imagination.”

Dog jumped down from their perch in Adam’s coat. 

“Do I have to go back?” they asked. 

Crowley shook his head, “Not if you wish to stay.” 

Dog smiled. 

They all joined hands in a circle around the crack (well everyone with hands at least) as Crowley explained his plan, which seemed all too elegant in its simplicity. Anathema, Aziraphale and Crowley all released their magic to flow about the circle, whilst the children were to imagine the hole closing. 

At first it seemed not to be working, as they all stood there, straining as they stared into swirling lilac. Then, ever so slowly, the edges started to knit back together. Anathema could feel her magic clash with the magic from the rift and it burned across her skin, all her hair standing on end and there were spots of white in her vision. But the two seams of rock were eventually joined, plunging them into darkness. 

Aziraphale blinked down at the floor. 

“It worked,” Crowley murmured, his hand still clasped around Aziraphale’s. “It’s done.”

* * *

Anathema sat below deck, her fingers wrapped around a warm cup of cocoa. She had no idea what time it was, but they had emerged from the fog surrounding the Island of the Dead and into darkness. The children were now all asleep, curled up together on the benches below deck, with Dog atop the pile. 

Opposite her, Aziraphale shut his book with a sigh. 

“You know,” he said, “I never did ask what that prophecy of yours was.”

“Oh,” she said, “It’s one of the Nutter Prophecies.”

He frowned a moment, “I’ve heard of those, I think. I must confess I don’t know anything about them.”

“My order studies them,” Anathema explained, “They’re prophecies that warn of supernatural events with the potential to end the world. Or cause a lot of trouble at least. We make sure these things don’t come to pass.”

“How many are there?”

“Over two thousand. This one had everyone particularly worried though.”

“Why?”

Anathema sighed, since it sounded rather silly now. 

“It was number six-six-six.”

Aziraphale chuckled, “Oh, I see. And the next one?”

She bit her lip a moment, “From what I remember, that’s the one that has something to do with the Irn-Bru recipe change.”

“How on Earth could that wipe out humanity?”

She shrugged, “That’s part of the problem, they’re often not all that helpful.”


	12. XI: AZ Fell & Co Bookshop

**XI**

**AZ Fell & Co Bookshop**

_Across from the bank on Tongue’s high street sits the family-run bookshop AZ Fell & Co, that has been open since 1953, after the original owner moved his shop from London (the original AZ Fell & Co was based in Soho and had been there since 1799). The shop itself is delightful; with a wide assortment for both the lover of the new and the collector of antiquarian books alike. The current Mr Fell is helpful, but never seemed particularly eager to leave his reading whenever I entered the shop. AZ Fell & Co also suffers from erratic opening hours that seem part of its bizarre business model; one to discourage customers from actually buying the books. _

* * *

“Anathema!” the Them shouted in unison, as the five of them burst through her front door. She tended not to lock it these days, as she would constantly be getting up to open it anyway. 

She sighed, setting down the watch she had finally got around to fixing, and gave them all a smile. 

“How can I help?”

It had been two weeks since they had returned from Eilean nan Taibhsean, and everything had settled down to normal. Well, mostly normal. After Crowley had helped them close the cracks at Slettel and Coldbackie, Anathema wasn’t sure she’d seen him in town at all. Aziraphale, meanwhile, had taken to opening his shop at regular hours. Stuart and Marj would not stop commenting about the change whenever she went in for her shopping. 

“We’ve just seen Crowley up at the castle,” said Dog. 

“And he was so sad. And alone,” said Adam.

“I’ve never seen him there without Aziraphale before,” said Pepper. 

“They’re acting like they don’t fucking know each other,” cried Brian, “It’s a load of piss!”

“My mum says that adults in relationships need to communicate properly,” Wensley said. 

“I don’t think they’re communicating at all!”

“Maybe there’s something we could do to help?”

“We could lock them in a room together until they talk,” Brian suggested. 

Pepper frowned, “How would we get them into the room?”

Anathema picked up her watch again, content to just let the children brainstorm. It wasn’t like they were actually going to do anything. After all, Aziraphale and Crowley had been around each other for thousands of years, surely they knew how to communicate with each other. 

-

Aziraphale was sat in the armchair by the window in his shop. He had a book open on his lap, but he had read the same sentence five times, as his attention kept drifting to Castle Bharraich atop the hill. He sighed and shook his head. He was just being silly. He and Crowley did not need to meet anymore; the crack was closed, and nobody; Celestial, Infernal or otherwise, was looking for them. 

The bell above the door rang, startling him from his reverie, and he turned to find Adam and Wensleydale. Pepper and Brian waved at him from the street and Dog barked excitedly from his spot in the basket of Adam’s bike. 

“Hello you two,” he greeted the boys, “How can I help you?”

“I was wondering if you have a book on dog care?” asked Adam. 

Wensley shuffled his feet, “And I wanted to see if you have the next Caleb Cleveland book yet?”

“I’m afraid young Wensleydale, that it hasn’t arrived yet, but I’ll let you know next week.”

“It’s okay,” he said, then opened his mouth, as if to say something else then promptly shut it again. 

“Now, Adam,” Aziraphale continued, “I think I might have something for you.”

He made his way over to the non-fiction section, turning as he heard a flurry of furious whispers behind him. Both boys immediately fell silent, fixing him with wide stares of faux-innocence. 

Aziraphale considered it for a moment, then decided he did not wish to be involved. As he processed Adam’s book at the till, Wensley piped up.  
“It sure is a nice day for a walk,” he said, sounding almost rehearsed. “I bet the view from the castle would be lovely.”

Aziraphale glanced out the window and smiled sadly, “I’m sure it would be.”

He handed Adam his book and fixed a brighter smile on his face. 

“Well, off you go you two, have a nice afternoon.”

“It really is a nice day Mr Fell,” said Adam, just as the door closed behind him. 

Aziraphale returned to his book and his seat in the window. 

It really was a nice afternoon. 

Well, he thought, a short walk couldn’t hurt.

* * *

It turned out that a short walk could hurt, mainly if you were slightly out of shape, and Aziraphale found himself resting, a little out of breath before he attempted the metal platform inside the castle. 

There was the clanging of footsteps as someone descended the steps and Aziraphale found himself face to face with someone achingly familiar. 

“Crowley,” he said, face creasing with an involuntary smile. “It’s nice to see you.”

Crowley smiled gently, leaning against the wall.

“Angel,” he said, “I didn’t expect to see you up here.”

“Yes, well,” said Aziraphale, wiping his palms on his trousers. “Something came over me and I decided to go for a walk.”

“You normally complain whenever we meet up here.”

They lapsed into silence for a moment and Aziraphale found himself staring at the reflection of the sea in Crowley’s sunglasses. 

“I’ve missed this,” he said. 

Crowley smiled, “I’ve missed you.”

“Oh.”

Crowley seemed as surprised by his response as Aziraphale was, but he didn’t retract it, just waited with bated breath as he watched Aziraphale’s face. 

Aziraphale smiled again, brighter this time. 

“I’ve missed you too.”

* * *

Anathema made her way down the road towards the Young’s home, where she’d been invited for Sunday lunch. As she passed the bookshop, she noticed Crowley’s Bentley parked outside. 

She smiled softly to herself as she peeked in the window, where she could see Aziraphale sat in an armchair with a book and a large black snake around his shoulders. 

It would seem the children were right after all.

Proper communication, indeed.


End file.
